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LESTER'S    HISTORY 


OF    THE 


United   States. 


ILLUSTRATED    IN    ITS    FIVE    GREAT    PERIODS: 

COLONIZATION, 

CONSOLIDATION, 

DEVELOPMENT, 

ACHIEVEMENT, 

ADVANCEMENT. 


BY 


C.  EDWARDS    LESTER, 


AUTHOR    OF 


"THE     GLORY     AND     SHAME     OF     ENGLAND,"     "THE    LIFE    AND    VOYAGES    OF    AMERICUS 

VESPUCIUS,"      "MY      CONSULSHIP,"      "THE      GALLERY      OF 

ILLUSTRIOUS  AMERICANS,'     ETC.,  ETC.,  ETC. 


Volume    I. 


NEW  YORK: 
P.    F.     COLLIER,    Publisher, 

1S83. 


Copyright   in    1883,    by 
P.   F.  COLLIER. 


LESTER'S   UNITED   STATES. 


DEDICATION  AND  CONTENTS.     I-XX 
THE  OPENING.     21-28. 


FIRST  PERIOD,  1492-1 776.  Xw* 


FROM  COLUMBUS  TO  THE  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPEN- 
DENCE. 


SECTION  FIRST. 

Discoveries. 

PAGE 

Europe  before  America  was  Discovered i 

Voyages  and  Discoveries  of  the  Cabots 2 

The  Memorable  Year  of  Discovery,  1498 3 

Irrepressible  Spirit  of  A  dventure 4 

Search  for  the  Elixir  of  Life  in  Florida 5 

First  Robbery  of  Men  on  American  Soil 6 

Magnificent  Expedition  of  De  Soto 7 

De  Soto  Discovers  the  Mississippi 8 

Burial  of  De  Soto  in  the  Mississippi 9 

Verrazzani's  Discoveries  on  the  American  Coast. . .  10 

The  Harbors  of  Newport  and  Boston 11 

James  Carder's  Expedition  from  France 12 

Carrier  Ascends  the  St.  Lawrence 13 

Francis  De  la  Roque's  Expedition 14 

The  Protestant  Reformation 15 

Coligny '  s  Huguenot  Colony  in  Florida 16 

Coligny  sends  a  Second  Expedition 17 

Melendez  sent  to  Exterminate  the  Huguenots 18 

St.  Augustine  founded. — The  Huguenots  Perish..  19 

England's  Throne  under  Elizabeth 20 

SECTION  SECOND. 

Beginning  of  American  Colonization 21 

How  England  began  to  Colonize  the  New  World. .  22 

Martin  Frobisher's  Second  Expedition 23 

How  England  was  to  Lead  Civilization 24 

Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert's  Two  Expeditions 25 

Raleigh  Lord  Proprietary  of  Virginia 26 

Raleigh's  Expedition  under  Amidas  and  Barlow. .  27 


PAG€ 

Raleigh's  next  Expedition  under  Grenville 38 

Grenville,  Lane,  Cavendish,  Hariot,  White 29 

Misfortunes  of  the  Colony. — Sir  Francis  Drake. . .  30 

An  Agricultural  State  to  be  founded 31 

Raleigh,  undaunted,  founds  another  Colony 32 

First  English  Child  torn  in  Virginia. 33 

Protestantism  and  the  Invincible  Armada 34 

Raleigh's  heroic  Efforts  for  Colonization 33 

Foundations  of  the  First  New  England  Colony. ...  36 

Shakespeare's  Prophecy  of  America 37 

Waymouth  Explores  the  Coast  of  Maine 38 

Captain  John  Smith 39 

Gorges,  Popham,  Hakluyt,  James  1 40 

The  London  and  Plymouth  Companies 41 

The  Colony  of  Jamestown  founded 42 

Death  of  Gosnold. — Smith's  heroic  Conduct 43 

Smith  made  Prisoner  by  the  Indians 44 

Smith's  Life  saved  by  Pocahontas. 45 

Smith's  Explorations  on  the  Chesapeake +( 

Smith's  Government  of  the  Colony 47 

Smith  superseded  by  Lord  Delaware 48 

Smith  returns  disabled  to  England 49 

Providential  Rescue  of  the  Colony 50 

Lord  Delaware  compelled  to  Return 5» 

Administration  of  Sir  Thomas  Gates 5a 

Improvement  in  the  Colony 53 

Love,  Conversion  and  Marriage  of  Pocahonta*. ...  54 

Ruin  of  the  French  Colony  in  Acadia 55 

Only  Fifty-lour  Colonists  left 56 

Arrival  of  Yeardley  at  Jamestown 57 

First  Legislative  Assembly  in  America 5I 


CONTENTS. 


PACK 

Efficient  Administration  of  Sandys 59 

Introduction  of  Negro  Slavery 60 

Smith  on  the  New  England  Coast 61 

Smith's  Second  Expedition  to  New  England 62 

Claims  of  Smith  to  American  Gratitude. 63 

The  Pilgrims  in  Holland 64 

Embarkation  of  the  Pilgrims ...    65 

Landing  on  the  Rock  of  Plymouth 66 

The  Mayflower  Sails  for  Home 67 

Sufferings  during  the  First  Winter 68 

Prince's  Chronological  History  of  New  England..     69 

The  Records  of  the  Pilgrims 70 

First  Dreadful  Winter  at  Plymouth 71 

First  Pilgrim  Treaty  with  the  Indians 72 

Origin  of  the  Colony  of  New  Netherland 73 

Power  and  Wealth  of  the  Dutch  Republic 74 

Hudson  seeks  a  Passage  to  Asia 75 

Discovery  and  Exploration  of  the  Hudson 76 

Return  and  Fate  of  Henry  Hudson. . .   77 

Block  Discovers  the  Connecticut 78 

The  Political  Condition  of  Holland 79 

Charter  of  the  Dutch  West  India  Company 80 

Friendly  Dutch  and  Pilgrim  Intercourse 81 

Progress  of  the  Dutch  Settlements 82 

Elements  of  National  Character  and  Wealth 83 

The  Three  Great  Colonies  Analyzed 84 

Impediments  to  Colonial  Growth 85 

The  Dutch  on  the  Hudson  and  Delaware 86 

Causes  of  the  Decline  of  the  Dutch. 87 

Character  of  Gustavus  Adolphus 88 

Plan  for  a  Great  Swedish  Colony '   89 

The  Swedes  and  Finns  on  the  Delaware 90 

Lord  Baltimore  founds  Maryland 91 

Broad  Toleration  of  the  Maryland  Charter 92 

Democratic  Government  Organized 93 

Establishment  of  the  Connecticut  Colony 94 

Daring  and  Sufferings  of  the  Settlers 95 

Roger  Williams  founds  Rhode  Island, 96 

First  Indian  War. — Extermination  of  the  Pequots.     97 

The  Connecticut  and  New  Haven  Colonies 98 

Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay 99 

History  of  Roger  Williams's  Character 100 

His  Broad  Views  on  Political  Rights. 101 

Sublimity  of  Williams's  Character 102 

His  Statue  in  the  National  Capitol 103 

Absolute  Toleration  first  Proclaimed 104 

The  Fate  of  Anne  Hutchinson 105 

Early  Colonization  of  Maine  and  New  Hampshire.   106 

r""First  Union  of  the  New  England  Colonies 107 

Nature  of  the  New  England  Confederacy 108 

Cromwell's  Commonwealth  established 109 

The  Character  of  the  Puritans no 

Their  .Social  and  Political  System in 

The  Puritans  and  us  Contrasted inT 

False  Judgments  of  their  Character 113 

Commencement  of  King  Philip's  War 114 

The  Scourge  of  Fire  and  Death 115 

Death  of  Philip.— New  Jersey  Settled 116 

Threatened  Ruin  of  New  Netherland 117 

The  History  of  New  York  begins 118 

William  Penn  and  his  Colony 119 

William  Penn  and  the  Quakers 120 

Penn's  History. — Imprisonments 121 

Penn  prepares  to  come  to  America 12a 


PAG* 

Penn's  First  Treaty  with  the  Indians     123 

The  History  of  Pennsylvania 124 

The  Indian  Problem  still  unsolved 125 

The  Nemesis  of  the  Red  Man's  Curse. 126 

Law  of  Civilization *27 

Political  System  of  Civilization 128 

Close  of  Penn's  noble  Career i2g 

Cheerful  Close  of  Penn's  Life 13c 

The  Great  Indian  Massacre  in  Virginia 131 

Progress  of  the  Carolinas 13a 

Quaker  and  Huguenot  Settlements 133 

Effects  of  Revocation  of  Edict  of  Nantes 134 

Emigration  of  the  Huguenots  to  America 135 

General  Oglethorpe  setdes  Georgia 136 

Resume"  of  Colonial  Foundations 137 

SECTION  THIRD. 

Struggle  for  the  Empire  of  North  America 138 

Spain— France — England  and  the  Americans 139 

Causes  of  the  Seven  Years'  War 140 

Claims  to  the  Region  of  New  France 141 

French  and  American  Population  compared 142 

Washington  begins  his  Military  Career 143 

First  Bloodshed  in  the  Seven  Years'  War 144 

Franklin  in  the  First  American  Congress 145 

Campaign  of  1755.    Zeal  of  the  Colonists 146 

Terrible  doom  of  Acadia 147 

Defeat  and  Death  of  General  Braddock 148 

Gen.  Johnson's  Expedition  to  Lake  George 149 

War  Formally  Proclaimed  Against  France 150 

Montcalm  Victorious  at  the  North 151 

Fatal  Policy  of  the  British  Ministry 152 

Pitt  called  to  the  Head  of  the  Empire 153 

The  Rendezvous  on  Lake  George 154 

Abercrombie's  Defeat — Death  of  Howe 155 

The  Capture  of  Fort  Duquesne 156 

Pitt's  Noble  Conduct  towards  the  Colonies 157 

Loss  of  Fort  Niagara  Fatal  to  the  French 158 

Death  of  Wolfe  and  Montcalm 159 

Close  of  the  Seven  Years'  War 160 

Conspiracy  and  Death  of  Pontiac 161 

Significance  of  the  Seven  Years'  War 16a 

SECTION  FOURTH. 

The  Interval  from  the  Close  of  the  Conflict  with 
France,  to  the  Beginning  of  the  Struggle  with 
England. 

A  National  Epic  on  the  Interval 163 

Moulding  of  Our  National  Character 164 

The  Leadeis  ef  the  Human  Race 165 

Second  Race  of  National  Moulders 166 

SECTION  FIFTH. 

The  Second  Race  of  Moulders  of  American  Char- 
acter and  Institutions. 

Character  of  Benjamin  Franklin 167 

Catalogue  of  Franklin's  Deeds 168 

Franklin's  Services  to  Mankind 169 

Lord  Brougham's  Judgment  of  Franklin 170 

Mirabeau's  Eulogy  on  Franklin 171 

Jonathan  Edwards  of  Connecticut 17a 

Ancestry  of  Edwards 173 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Life  and  Genius  of  Edwards 174 

His  Moral  and  Intellectual  Character 175 

Edwards  and  Webster  Compared 176 

John  Wesley  in  Westminster  Abbey 177 

Early  Life  and  Studies  of  Wesley 178 

The  Foundations  of  Methodism  Laid   1 79 

Triumphs  of  Wesley's  Last  Days 180 

James  Otis  of  Massachusetts 181 

Beginning  of  Otis's  Career 182 

Rights  of  the  Colonies  Asserted  and  Proved 183 

Otis  the  Father  of  the  Stamp  Act  Congress 184 

First  Blast  of  the  Revolution 185 

Revolutionary  Speech  of  Otis 186 

Patrick  Henry  of  Virginia 187 

Hero  Worship  in  Biographers 188 

Youth  of  Patrick  Henry 189 

Henry's  Poverty  and  Early  Struggles 190 

Henry  is  Admitted  to  the  Bar 191 

Henry's  Triumph  in  the  Parson's  Case 19a 

His  Election  to  the  House  of  Burgesses 193 

Henry's  Five  Resolutions 194 

Terrific  Power  of  Henry's  Eloquence 195 

He  Reaches  the  Summit  of  Glory 196 

Institutions  of  Learning  in  the  Colonies 197 

SECTION  SIXTH. 

Institutions  of  Learning  in  the  Colonies. 

The  First  American  College  Founded 198 

Early  History  of  Harvard  College 199 

Great  Men  Sent  Out  from  Harvard 200 

William  and  Mary  College 201 

Its  Struggles  and  Triumphs 202 

National  Injustice  towards  William  and  Mary..  203 

Yale  College 204 

Early  History  of  Yale  College 205 

Its  Great  Contributions  to  Learning 206 

The  College  of  New  Jersey 207 

Its  Benefactors  and  Illustrious  Men 208 

King's  College — now  Columbia. 209 

Its  Founders  and  Early  Friends 210 

Its  Fortunes  during  the  Revolution 211 

King's  becomes  Columbia  College. 212 

Present  Condition  of  Columbia 213 

The  University  of  Pennsylvania 214 

Rhode  Island  College — Brown  University 215 

Its  Succession  of  Eminent  Men 216 

Its  Present  Resources  and  Standing 217 

Rutger's  College— Its  Struggles  Rewarded 218 

Its  Reorganization  and  Permanent  Endowments . .  219 

Origin  of  Dartmouth  College 220 

Dartmouth  Refounded  by  Daniel  Webster .  221 

What  Dartmouth  has  Done  for  the  World 222 

The  Library  Company  of  Philadelphia 223 

The  Redwood  Library — Bishop  Berkeley 224 

Dr.  Channing  in  the  Redwood  Library 225 

History  of  the  Redwood  Library 226 

The  New  York  Society  Library 227 

Charleston  Library 228 


SECTION  SEVEN1H. 

PAG1 
Dawn  of  the  Revolution — Tok«ns  of  its  Approach 
— Causes  which  immediately  led  to  the  De- 
claration of  Independence 228 

Profound  Loyalty  of  the  Colonists 229 

Affection  of  our  Forefathers  for  England 23a 

How  England  alienated  her  Colonies 231 

Merle  D'Aubign^'s  Views  of  American  Character. .  23a 

Tribute  to  D'Aubigne*  and  Count  Cavour 233 

Passage  of  the  Stamp  Act 234 

The  Colonies  go  into  Mourning 23s 

The  Provincial  Congress  of  1765 236 

Franklin  at  the  Bar  of  Commons 237 

Struggle  for  Liberty  in  Parliament 238 

Repeal  of  the  Stamp  Act 239 

Fresh  Aggressions  on  the  Colonies . .  „ 240 

The  Tea  thrown  into  Boston  Harbor 041 

Sympathy  with  Massachusetts 242 

Spirit  of  Independence  in  Virginia 244 

Meeting  of  the  Continental  Congress 244 

Characteristics  of  the  Principal  Delegates 245 

Proceedings  of  the  Continental  Congress 246 

The  Solemnity  of  the  Occasion 247 

'  "Chatham's  Defence  of  America 248 

First  Blood  of  the  Revolution 249 

Capture  of  Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point 250 

Mecklenberg  Declaration  of  Independence. 251 

Preparations  for  Battle 252 

The  Day  of  Bunker  Hill 253 

Webster's  Description  of  the  Battle 254 

Fifty  Years  after  the  Battle 255 

Webster's  Bunker  Hill  Oration 256 

Washington  appointed  Commander-in-Chief 257 

Washington  sets  out  for  Cambridge 258 

Washington's  Reception  in  New  York 255 

The  four  Major- Generals  appointed 260 

Jealousy  of  Military  Power 261 

A  People  in  Arms — not  an  Army 262 

Virginia  leads  the  Grand  Insurrection 263 

Franklin  appointed  Postmaster-General 264 

The  Olive  Branch  rejected  by  the  King 265 

Foreign  Mercenaries  employed 266 

Help  asked  from  Catharine  of  Russia .  267 

Russia  our  Natural  Ally 268 

Congress  begins  to  build  a  Navy 269 

Invasion  of  Canada  determined  on. 270 

Arnold's  March  through  the  Wilderness 271 

Death  of  Montgomery 272 

English  Talent  sides  with  America 273 

Final  Separation  approaching =74 

The  American  Flag  first  raised 275 

Washington  marches  to  New  York 276 

Patriotism  and  Valor  of  South  Carolina. 277 

Chivalry  of  Jasper 278 

Early  History  of  Thomas  Paine 279 

Influence  of  Paine' s  Political  Writings 280 

His  Characteristics  as  a  Writer 281 

Paine's  Influence  in  the  Army 282 

Public  Testimonials  for  his  Services  to  the  Nation.  283 


CONTENTS. 

SECOND    PERIOD,    1776-1815. 

CONSOLIDATION    AND    STATESMANSHIP. 

FROM    THE    DECLARATION    OF    INDEPENDENCE,   TO    THE 
CLOSE  OF  THE  SECOND  WAR  WITH  ENGLAND. 


SECTION  FIRST. 
Declaration  of  Independence. 

PAGE 

Lee's  Resolution  for  Independence 285 

The  great  Debate  in  Secret  Session 286 

The  Morning  of  the  Fourth  of  July 287 

John  Adams'  last  Argument  for  the  Declaration. .  288 
[Declaration  of  Independence — Eight  pages.] 

Final  Adoption  of  the  Declaration 289 

Reception  of  the  Declaration  by  the  Army 290 

Its  Reception  by  the  People 291 

Its  Reception  by  Mankind 292 

Its  Reception  by  our  Enemies 293 

How  could  the  Declaration  be  made  good 294 

Resources  of  the  Country 29s 

Agriculture  and  Population 296 

Revolutionary  Troops  and  Militia 297 

Elements  of  the  Revolutionary  War 298 

The  Empire  to  crush  the  Republic 299 

The  Battle  of  Long  Island 300 

Washington's  Address  to  the  Army 301 

The  Retreat  from  Long  Island 302 

How  the  Retreat  was  conducted 303 

Death  of  Hale,  the  American  Spy 304 

Results  of  the  Brooklyn  Disaster 305 

Discouraging  Condition  of  the  Army 306 

Contrast  between  the  contending  Parties 307 

Last  Four  Dark  Months  of  1776 308 

Trying  Position  of  Washington 309 

Bad  Character  of  General  Lee 310 

Washington  crosses  the  Hudson 311 

Fall  of  Fort  Washington — Terrible  Loss 312 

Disloyalty  of  General  Lee 313 

Washington's  Retreat  through  the  Jerseys 314 

Darkest  Hours  of  the  Revolution 315 

The  British  Army  reaches  the  Delaware 316 

Alarm  in  Philadelphia 317 

Flight  of  Congress  to  Baltimore 318 

A  deeper  Gloom  over  the  Country 319 

Approaching  doom  of  the  Hessians 320 

Washington's  plan  for  saving  the  Nation 321 

I*he  Leader's  Advice  taken 32a 

SECTION  SECOND, 

New  Era  in  the  War  for  Independence — Washing- 
ton clothed  with  Authority  to  prosecute  it 323 

Crossing  the  Delaware 324 


PAGB 

The  Night  Victory  at  Trenton 325 

Washington  at  Rail's  Death-bed 326 

How  Robert  Morris  raised  Money 327 

Washington  clothed  with  new  Authority 328 

Washington  concentrates  all  his  Forces 329 

Night  Flight  from  Trenton 330 

The  Battle  of  Princeton 331 

Winter  Quarters  at  Morristown 332 

Immense  Results  of  a  brief  Campaign 333 

Its  Effect  at  Home  and  Abroad 334 

How  Washington  dealt  with  Tories 33s 

Washington  and  Franklin  at  Christmas 336 

Preparations  for  the  Campaign  of  1777 337 

SECTION  THIRD. 

State  Building— Thirteen  Independent  Democra- 
tic Commonwealths  founded 338 

Training  of  American  Statesmen 339 

Constitutions  of  the  Thirteen  States 340 

Constitutions  of  N.   H.,  S.   C,  R.  I.,  Conn.,Va., 

N.J 341 

Constitutions  of  Del.,  Penn.,   Md.,  N.  C,  Ga., 
N.Y 342 

SECTION  FOURTH. 

Preparations  of  the  British  for  the  Campaign  of 

1777 343 

Germany  scoured  for  more  Troops 344 

Tryon's  Foray  into  Connecticut 345 

Expeditions  to  Sag  Harbor  and  Newport 346 

An  Embassy  to  France 347 

First  Interview  with  Vergennes 348 

What  America  asked  of  Louis 349 

Embarkation  of  Lafayette 350 

Sprague's  Welcome  to  Lafayette 351 

Lafayette's  Career  delineated 35a 

Why  he  espoused  our  Cause 353 

Burgoyne's  projected  Invasion 354 

Investment  of  Ticonderoga 355 

Victory  of  Bennington 356 

Heroism  of  Stark  and  Warner 357 

A  Bloody  raid  on  the  Mohawk 358 

Indian  atrocities — Miss  M'Crea  massacred 359 

Schuyler  superseded — Burgoyne's  extremity 360 

Burgoyne  prepares  for  Battle 361 

First  Battle  of  Bemis's  Heights 36a 

Burgoyne's  last  Battle 363 


CONTENTS. 


PAGB 

Burgoyne's  Surrender 364 

Consequences  of  the  Northern  Victories 365 

Effect  of  the  News  in  Europe 3JJP 

Situation  of  Lord  North 367 

From  Versailles  to  Valley  Forge 368 

I-afayette  at  the  Battle  of  Brandywine 369 

Washington' s  S  trategy  during  1 777 37° 

The  Winter  at  Valley  Forge 37* 

A  Conspiracy  to  supersede  Washington 372 

SECTION  FIFTH. 

The  Alliance  with  France 373 

Immediate  Results  of  the  French  Alliance 374 

Sympathy  of  Frederic  of  Prussia 375 

Friendship  of  the  Queen  of  France 37*5 

Franklin  at  the  Palace,  and  the  Academy 377 

The  French  Fleet  sails  for  America 378 

British  Commissioners  for  Peace 379 

Meeting  of  Franklin  and  Voltaire 38° 

Voltaire's  Place  in  Philosophical  History 381 

Fete  in  Honor  of  Lord  Howe 382 

Howe's  Last  American  Achievement 383 

How  our  Prisoners  of  War  were  treated 384 

La  Fayette  Visits  his  Home 38S 

La  Fayette's  Estimate  of  Washington 386 

The  Hard-won  Field  of  Monmouth 387 

Washington's  Curse  on  Lee 388 

The  Massacre  of  Wyoming 389 

The  Doomed  Garden  Vale. .  ^ 39° 

Desolation  of  the  Happy  Valley 391 

Indian  Slaughter— British  Policy 392 

French  Fleet  in  American  Waters 393 

A  Marauding  Expedition  to  Virginia 394 

Anthony  Wayne  Storms  Stony  Point 395 

Clinton's  Barbarity  in  the  South 396 

Fortune  Favors  us  on  the  Sea 397 

Brilliant  Deeds  of  Paul  Jones 398 

Darkling  Close  of  1779 399 

The  Horizon  begins  to  Brighten, 400 

Treason  of  Benedict  Arnold 401 

Meeting  of  Arnold  and  Andre* 402 

Treason  Plotted  at  Midnight 403 

The  Upper  Chamber  one  Autumn  Day 404 

The  Miscarriage  of  the  Plot. 405 

Andre1  Sleeps  in  Westminster  Abbey 406 

Victories  of  Cowpens  and  Guilford 407 

G.-eene's  Generalship  in  the  South 408 

SECTION  SIXTH. 
IT.;  War  for  Independence  Drawing  to  a  Close. . .  409 

H'jtorical  Tributes  to  Connecticut 410 

Connecticut's  Place  in  the  Republic 411 

Arnold's  Maraud  on  New  London 412 

Evacuation  of  New  London 413 

The  Doom  of  the  Traitor  Arnold 414 

Surrender  of  Cornwallis 415 

End  of  the  Seven  Years'  Tragedy 416 

Disbanding  the  Continental  Army 417 

Effect  in  Europe  of  Cornwallis' s  Surrender 418 

SECTION  SEVENTH. 
Peace 418 

Lord  Shelbourne's  Lettei  to  Franklin 419 


PAG» 

Preliminary  Articles  to  Peace 420 

Washington  Parting  with  his  Officers. 42 1 

Washington  Resigns  his  Commission 42a 

His  Parting  Words  to  Congress 483 

SECTION  EIGHTH. 

Under  the  Articles  of  Confederation 4*4 

Signers  to  the  Articles  of  Confederation 435 

Evils  of  a  mere  Confederacy 426 

SECTION  NINTH. 

The  Adoption  of  the  Na  tional  Constitution 427 

Difficulties  to  be  Overcome 428 

A  New  Creation  of  Statesmanship . 429 

The  Three  Inevitable  Parties  among  Men 430 

Slavery  First  makes  Trouble 431 

The  Constitution  at  last  Completed ....   43a 

SECTION  TENTH. 

Administration  of  Washington 433 

Washington's  Farmer  Life 434 

Washington's  Last  Visit  to  his  Mother 435 

The  First  Presidential  Inauguration 436 

The  Simple  Ceremonies 437 

The  Solemn  Worship  in  St.  Paul's 438 

Washington's  Confidential  Advisers 439 

Hamilton  Establishes  our  Financial  System 440 

The  Judiciary  of  the  United  States 441 

Vermont  Admitted  to  the  Union 442 

Our    Foreign    Relations  —  Washington's    Second 

Term 443 

Apprehended  Troubles  with  France 444 

Bitter  Party  Conflicts 443 

A  Second  War  with  England  Threatened 446 

English  Arrogance  on  the  Ocean 447 

War  Averted  by  Jay's  Treaty 448 

Washington  Retires  from  Public  Life 449 

John  Adams  Succeeds  Washington 450 

Origin  of  Hail  Columbia. 451 

Death  of  Washington 452 

Napoleon's  Tribute  to  Washington 453 

A  Pilgrimage  to  Mount  Vernon 454 

[Washington's  Character — Eight  pages.] 

Jefferson  and  his  Administration 455 

Acquisition  of  the  Territory  of  Louisiana 45<S 

War  with  Tripoli 457 

The  Burr-Hamilton  Duel 458 

The  True  Merits  of  the  Combatants 459 

Real  Objects  of  Burr's  Expedition 46b 

Burr  in  his  Home '461 

Madison  elected  Jefferson's  Successor. 46* 

Fresh  Aggressions  of  Great  Britain 463 

SECTION  ELEVENTH. 

The  Second  War  with  England 4<">4 

Hostilities  on  Land  and  Sea 463 

Re-election  of  Madison 466 

Perry's  Victory  on  Lake  Erie 467 

Don't  give  up  the  Ship 468 

Wellington's  Veterans  in  the  Struggle 469 

Burning  of  the  American  Capitol 470 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Mrs.  Madiscn's  Heroic  Conduct 471 

MacDonough's  Victory  on  Lake  Champlain 472 

Approach  of  the  Final  Struggle 473 

Peace  Conquered  at  New  Orleans 474 

The  Fruits  of  Fifty  Years'  Work 475 

Education  of  the  whole  People 476 

Practical  Philosophy  of  General  Education 477 

One  Language  for  &  Great  People 478 


PAGB 

The  Schoolmaster  of  the  Republic 479 

English  to  be  the  Universal  Language 480 

Our  Debt  to  Noah  Webster 481 

Fortunes  of  Webster's  Spelling-Book 48a 

[An  Original  Map  op  the  United  States  with  the 
Territorial  Divisions  of  1815  ;  illustrative  of  the 
First  Two  Periods  of  Our  First  Hundred 
Years.    1492-1776.  1776-1815.  End  of  Vol.  I.] 


THE   OPENING. 


The  climber  of  the  far  Western  Mountains,  who  drinks  from  the 
rivulet  sparkling  at  his  feet,  cannot  resist  emotions  of  grandeur  when 
told,  that  for  thousands  of  miles  it  flows  on,  till  it  swells  into  the 
solemn  Mississippi. 

I  want  the  reader  to  go  with  me  to  the  fountain-head  of  our 
Nation's  Life,  and  together  we  will  follow  the  stream  down  the 
rugged  hills  ;  through  the  grand  old  woods  ;  in  its  long  reaches 
among  waving  fields  ;  and  by  great  cities  as  it  sweeps  on  in  its  re- 
sistless tide  to  the  sea. 

Nor  shall  he  find  it  a  weary  voyage,  if  he  carries  as  cheerful  a 
heart  as  still  beats  in  the  bosom  of  the  pilot  who  will  steer  his  bark. 

If  my  fellow-voyager  be  a  fair  maiden,  she  shall  learn  something 
of  the  romance  of  the  primitive  forest,  and  how  "the  Indian  lover 
wooed  his  dusky  mate."  She  shall  learn,  too,  something  dearer  and 
more  beautiful  far — the  imperishable  story  of  the  loves  and  sufferings, 
of  the  matchless  wives  and  daughters  of  the  old  colonial,  and  revolu- 
tionary days. 

If  a  brave  boy,  just  coming  up  into  life,  like  a  beautiful  morning 
spread  on  the  mountains  without  a  single  cloud,  he  shall  learn  what 
stuff  the  men  who  built  this  nation  were  made  of;  and  how  courage, 
virtue,  and  truth  can  alone  cover  manhood  with  honor. 

If  a  soldier,  he  shall  look  on  the  battle-fields  where  daring  and 
patriotism  won  the  crowning  wreaths  of  valor  and  freedom. 

If  a  sailor,  he  shall  hear  the  guns  of  Jones,  Porter,  Bainbridge, 
Perry,  and  Decatur,  and  listen  to  the  death-cry  of  Lawrence,  "  Don't 
give  up  the  ship  !  " 

If  a  farmer,  at  what  price  the   husbandman  reaped  the  scanty 


THE  OPENING. 

crops  that  fed  the  growing  family,  with  no  luxury  to  make  beautiful 
their  homely,  hard-working  life. 

If  a  preacher  of  the  gospel,  he  shall  again  see  how  the  founders 
of  Christianity  in  America  did  their  Master's  work. 

If  a  mechanic,  he  shall  see  men  leaving  their  work- benches  for 
battle-fields,  and  halls  of  legislation. 

If  a  student  of  science,  he  shall  enter  the  laboratories  of  Franklin, 
Whitney,  Fulton,  and  Morse. 

If  a  statesman,  he  shall  learn  from  the  Founders  of  the  Republic, 
how  to  make  Codes  and  Treaties,  and  how  to  build  up  States.  And 
so  shall  he  more  fully  comprehend  how  the  foundations  of  this 
mighty  edifice,  which  now  shelters  so  many  millions  of  free  and 
happy  people,  were  laid  ;  how  the  fair  structure  rose  ;  and  how  it  is 
at  last  enriched  by  trophies  of  art  in  every  field  of  labor,  and  crowded 
with  emblems  of  national  glory. 

The  stranger  is  sure  of  a  warm  welcome  on  these  shores,  for  our 
fathers  were  all  strangers  here ;  and  America  has  always  been  the 
Stranger'/S  Paradise.  To  him,  I  would  offer  a  landscape  of  our  social 
life  and  history,  from  which  he  may  more  readily  get  a  broad,  but 
clear  view  of  what  has  been  done  by  Americans  at  home — what  use- 
ful contributions  we  have  made  to  the  world,  not  only  in  multiplying 
wealth  and  comfort,  but  in  elevating  men :  how  human  life  has 
got  a  new  value  here.  For  this,  after  all,  is  the  grandest  lesson 
which  the  European  can  learn  from  us.  If  he  misses  this,  he  misses 
all :  since,  if  we  have  solved  no  higher  problems  than  in  mechanics, 
we  have  lived  in  vain.  If  man  himself  has  gained  no  new  worth  on 
this  continent,  it  may  just  as  well  have  been  left  unwaked  from  its 
dreamless  sleep  of  ages.  If  the  European  does  not  see  something  of 
all  this,  he  may  almost  as  well  have  staid  at  home. 

In  writing  a  full  History  of  the  United  States,  from  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  to  the  close  of  the  first  hundred  years,  the  historian 
would  feel  that  he  was  touching  upon  a  wide  sea  of  toilsome  adven- 
ture. To  execute  such  a  work  with  any  degree  of  fulness,  would  re- 
quire as  ample  space  as  Gibbon  filled  in  his  "  Decline  and  Fall  of  the 
Roman  Empire,"  or  Bancroft  in  his  voluminous  "  History."  But  in 
this  work,  the  writer  was  of  necessity  brought  within  such  narrow  limits, 
that  he  could  hope  to  give,  even  the  intelligent  reader,  only  a  clear 


THE  OPENING. 

view  of  the  progress  of  the  American  people  during  the  first  century 
of  their  national  existence.  The  plan  of  publication  imperatively 
precluded  a  minute  enumeration  of  events.  But  this  is  a  matter  of 
little  regret,  since  nobody  would  have  read  it :  and  most  authors  now 
write  to  get  readers,  rather  than  to  display  learning. 

But  with  what  the  publishers  have  generously  granted  in"  space 
and  my  own  rigorous  efforts  at  condensation  may  have  accomplished, 
I  have  endeavored  to  sweep  the  entire  field  :  and  if  by  seizing  and 
illustrating  only  points  of  stirring  interest,  or  special  significance,  the 
reader  may  carry  away  from  the  perusal,  the  spirit  of  our  history — 
a  clear  conception  of  the  causes  which  led  to  the  establishment  of 
Free  Institutions  in  North  America — the  way  in  which  Independence 
was  achieved — the  character  and  deeds  of  the  Founders  of  the  Re- 
public, and  the  leading  indices  of  its  otherwise  incomprehensible  ad- 
vancement, I  shall  be  very  thankful. 

The  va'lue  of  a  history  cannot  be  measured  by  its  length ;  and 
while  scholars  and  statesmen  must  cultivate  a  familiar  acquaintance 
with  the  most  copious  annals  of  nations,  yet  we  find  that  from  the 
earliest  periods,  those  records  of  human  affairs  which  have  been  of 
the  most  service  to  the  mass  of  mankind,  have  been  written  with 
brevity.  Many  a  work  of  value  has  been  buried  under  the  mountain  of 
its  own  words.  Many  of  the  best  authors,  too,  are  either  writing  less 
voluminously,  or  abridging  their  own  works,  being  sure  that  unless 
they  do  it  themselves  it  may  be  less  satisfactorily  done  by  other  hands. 

We  are,  moreover,  living  in  so  active  and  bustling  a  period,  that 
few  persons  can  find  time  to  read  large  and  exhaustive  books. 
Modern  life  has  become  too  valuable,  complicated,  and  exacting 
with  most  of  us,  for  anything  that  does  not  produce  early  practical 
results.  Our  seed-times  and  harvests  are  being  crowded  closer  to- 
gether.    In  many  a  field  the  plow  is  seen  following  the  reaper. 

The  age  of  contemplation  and  retirement  has  passed — the  age  of 
execution  has  come.  The  life  of  a  generation  is  a  longer  period  now, 
than  was  once  the  life  of  an  Empire.  America  first  taught  mankind 
the  real  value  of  time,  and  by  what  standard  it  should  be  calculated. 
It  is  no  longer  measured  by  successive  vibrations  of  the  pendulum, 
but  by  succession  of  ideas.  Not  by  minutes,  but  by  results — not  by 
seconds  even,  but  by  revolutions.     The  hours  are  no  more  marked 


THE  OPENING. 

by  the  sun-dial,  or  the  hour-glass,  but  by  strokes  of  the  engine,  and 
flashes  of  the  telegraph. 

I  wish  I  could  have  had  ampler  room  to  portray  the  lives  of  the 
Fathers  of  American  Liberty,  for  we  can  never  love  this  broad 
land  too  well,  nor  drink  in  too  deep  the  spirit  of  the  men  of  the 
Revolution.  If  the  rich  heritage  they  left  us  is  to  be  kept  unim- 
paired, and  we  are  to  transmit  to  a  far  future  the  noble  institutions 
which  greeted  our  accession  to  civic  life,  it  will  be  chiefly  because  we 
shall  have  remembered  the  counsels,  revered  the  names,  and  enshrined 
the  virtues  of  the  Heroes,  Patriots  and  Statesmen  of  the  early  days 
of  the  Republic. 

The  world  has  now  had  a  century  to  contemplate  the  character 
of  Washington,  and  the  impartial  judgment  of  mankind  has 
pronounced  him  the  greatest  and  best  of  men.  No  man  of  his  time, 
and  no  one  who  came  after  him,  but  revered  his  character.  His 
name  is  the  watch-word  of  all  nations  striking  for  freedom.  He  is 
indeed  beyond  my  poor  praise.  I  would  only  reach  the  foot  of  the 
mountain  where  he  stood,  when  he  was  taken  from  the  scenes  of  his 
triumph  on  earth,  to  be  welcomed  by  the  God  and  Father  of  Liberty 
in  His  Eternal  Temple. 

The  time  has  hardly  come  to  estimate  the  influence  of  America 
upon  the  fortunes  of  the  human  race.  But  I  hold  firmly  to  the 
belief,  that  George  Washington  and  his  companions,  with  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  in  their  hands,  are  destined  to  ac- 
complish for  the  political  redemption  of  mankind,  what  Jesus  Christ 
and  His  apostles  with  the  Gospel,  have  achieved  for  man's  spiritual 
elevation.  The  character  of  the  present  age  has  in  this  country, 
been  moulded  altogether  by  the  men  and  events  of  which  I  have 
spoken ;  and  in  contemplating  the  future,  what  transporting  prospects 
stretch  out  before  us,  if  we  only  prove  true  to  ourselves  ! 

A  new  and  better  day  for  mankind  is  everywhere  breaking.  The 
schoolmaster  has  left  the  University,  and  gone  abroad  through  the 
world.  He  is  in  Labrador,  and  Patagonia  ;  he  is  building  American 
school-houses  in  Japan,  and  in  the  distant  islands  of  the  South  Seas  ; 
he  has  sailed  up  the  Golden  Horn  ;  he  has  passed  the  Pyramids. 
We  are  beginning  to  do  for  the  minds  of  men,  what  we  once  did  only 
for  their  bodies.     Every  sign  in  the  political   and  moral  firmament, 


THE  OPENING. 

betokens  progress,  and  inspires  hope.  The  whole  world  is  in  motion, 
and  the  whole  world  is  bidding  us  God-speed. 

The  tidal-wave  which  started  from  Plymouth  Rock,  and  James 
River,  has  begun  to  surge  around  the  shores  of  old  Asia  ;  and  as  its 
swarming  communities  turn  their  backs  on  the  hoary  cypresses, 
which  for  dreary  centuries  held  their  steady  moan  over  those  gray 
sepulchres  of  eight  hundred  millions  of  the  buried-alive,  they  feel  the 
undulations  of  The  AMERICAN  AGE. 

The  Black-Letter  Age  has  gone  by,  to  return  no  more.  And  who 
would  roll  back  our  advancing  car  again  into  the  murky  shadows  of 
those  gloomy  ages  ?  Would  you  rebuild  the  Pyramids  for  dead 
Pharaohs  ?  The  world's  commerce  for  living  man  is  already  moving 
by  steam  through  the  Isthmus  of  Suez,  and  the  enlightened  ruler  of 
Egypt  has  put  a  hundred  thousand  men  to  building  a  railway  to  the 
sources  of  the  Nile.  Would  you  again  launch  five  million  Crusaders 
on  the  plains  of  Asia  ?  Men  are  no  longer  looking  to  the  East  for 
light.  Old  Berkeley's  prophecy  has  become  history :  "  Westward  the 
Star  of  Empire  takes  its  way."  Would  you  re-dig  the  dungeons,  or 
reconstruct  the  Bastiles  of  the  past,  or  light  again  the  fires  of 
religious  persecution  ?     "  Go,  be  a  dog,  and  bay  the  moon  !  " 

Four  centuries  ago,  a  monk's  pen  produced  one  illuminated 
book  in  a  lifetime.  The  Literature  of  the  world  is  now  thrown  off  by 
the  Titan  arms  of  steam.  One  deed  of  humanity,  or  one  bold  stroke 
for  freedom,  is  worth  more  now  than  a  thousand  sectarian  dogmas. 

When  men  can  think  free,  they  will  act  free.  Europe  has  waked 
up  to  achieve  her  freedom  ;  and  although  the  struggle  for  arbitrary 
power  is  still  waged  with  subtlety  and  desperation,  yet  the  wronged 
millions  of  the  Old  World  are  sweeping  thrones  and  hierarchies  to 
the  dust.  The  tide  of  battle  between  liberty  and  despotism,  between 
the  principles  of  our  fathers,  and  the  principles  of  kings—  in  a  word, 
between  the  past  and  the  future,  may,  and  will,  ebb  and  flow.  But 
it  is  a  struggle  for  principle;  and  a  struggle  for  principle  is  a  steadier 
and  a  stronger  one  than  the  struggle  for  bread.  There  is  no  danger 
like  that  of  trying  to  scourge  the  newly-emancipated  spirit  back  to 
its  prison-house.  It  is  the  frenzy  of  madness  for  governments,  with 
the  wrong  all  on  their  side,  to  attempt,  by  rifled  cannon,  and  troops 
of  the  line,  to   arrest  the  avalanche-rush  of  millions  towards  their 


THE  OPENING. 

rights.  Over  such  frail  barriers,  the  tread  of  the  multitude  is  like 
the  march  of  the  storm. 

It  is  not  always  that  nine-tenths  of  mankind  are  to  suffer  from, 
want,  that  the  remaining  fraction  may  be  able  to  die  of  surfeit. 
Equality  among  all  classes  in  civil  rights,  is  the  goal  towards  which 
the  world  is  marching,  and  it  will  reach  it.  What  tumults  and  chaos 
and  blood  lie  between  them  and  it,  no  man  can  tell.  But  if  need 
be,  through  these  it  must  be  reached,  through  them  it  will  pass  ;  for, 
armed  with  the  Almighty's  decree,  press  enslaved  mankind  to  free- 
dom. 

How  slow,  or  how  fast  is  to  be  its  march,  none  but  the  God  of 
Nations  can  tell.  We  only  hear  the  tread  of  the  advancing  multi- 
tude. We  only  believe  that  it  is  a  part  of  the  Creator's  plan  to 
bring  all  his  children  up  to  competence  and  comfort ;  and  every 
government  and  institution  that  does  not  wheel  into  the  movement, 
will  be  overthrown.  Vainer  than  a  dream  is  the  expectation  of 
arresting  this  onward  movement  of  the  race.  The  world  shall  not 
be  dragged  back  to  its  former  darkness  and  slavery.  The  power 
to  do  it  has  passed  forever  from  the  hands  of  despots.  War, 
anarchy,  and  madness  may  drench  the  earth  in  blood  ;  but  civilized 
man  is  no  longer  to  sit  tamely  down  under  oppression.  Its  silent, 
deadly  tooth  is  no  longer  to  sink  unresisted,  into  his  bruised  and 
bleeding  flesh.  The  world  has  heard  the  shout  of  freedom,  and  is 
straining  on  its  fetters.  It  is  saying  to  its  oppressors  : — "  The  cup 
of  trembling  ye  have  so  long  pressed  to  our  lips,  we  will  drain  no 
more  forever — we  are  men  !  " 

Such  have  been  some  of  the  fruits  of  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence, and  the  example  and  achievements  of  our  fathers. 

Gathering  as  we  shall  on  the  approaching  Centennial  morning  of 
the  Fourth  of  July,  1876,  under  domes  and  arches,  and  in  halls 
and  hamlets  everywhere  dedicated  to  Liberty  and  Worship,  how  un- 
worthy will  the  aspiration  of  any  American  heart  prove,  which  shall 
not  be  as  broad,  and  pure,  and  grand,  as  are  the  principles  of 
the  Constitution  which  binds  this  vast  cluster  of  Commonwealths 
together ! 

Let  us  come  then  to  the  National  Altar,  and  receive  afresh  its 
regenerating  baptism  of  patriotic  fire  : — worthy  members  of  a  grand 


THE  OPENING. 

fraternity  whose  interests  are  as  boundless  as  the  continent  is  wide, 
and  whose  prejudices  and  passions  are  engendered  by  a  land  bounded 
on  the  North  by  eternal  ice,  and  stretching  to  the  South  where  we  see 
the  wings  of  our  Eagle  flapping  over  the  heated  line  of  the  Equator, 
— and  from  the  Atlantic  coast  with  its  teeming  cities  and  freighted 
argosies,  to  the  golden  shores  of  the  Pacific ! 

With  such  a  country,  with  so  many  interests  to  subserve,  with 
such  boundless  hopes  freighting  the  ship  of  State  as  she  moves  down 
into  the  next  century,  let  us,  in  God's  name,  all  be  brothers !  Let 
the  Genius  of  Liberty  sweep  into  the  all-forgetting  River  every  sign 
and  trophy  of  our  first  and  last  civil  conflict ;  and  as  they  float  away 
into  eternal  oblivion,  we  will  forget,  embrace,  and  love. 

And  so  we  shall  last :  and  amidst  the  wrecks  of  other  so-called 
republics,  strewn  along  the  shores  of  Time,  we  will  hold  the  ori- 
flamme  still  blazing  on  the  eyes  of  the  millions  of  the  Old  World, 
who  are  patiently  waiting  for  the  redemption  of  the  Nations. 


THE    CHARACTEK    OF    WASHINGTON. 

Theke  is  the  same  difficulty  in  portraying  the  character  of 
Washington,  that  we  find  in  describing  the  grandest  works  of 
nature.  Here  the  painter  has  a  clear  advantage  over  the  writer. 
Even  the  words  of  the  Greek  orator,  give  a  very  poor  idea  of  the 
effect  of.  his  oration.  '  The  wonder-working  part  of  all  oratory 
must  needs  perish  in  the  delivery.'  As  the  pen  never  can  make 
the  reader  feel  as  he  does  when  he  hears  one  of  the  symphonies 
of  Beethoven ;  or  the  confused  noises  of  a  mob  start  the  blood  of 
the  war-horse  like  the  blast  of  the  bugle,  or  the  thunder  of  artil- 
lery ;  as  the  inspired  lines  of  the  poet  are  but  a  poor  substitute  for 
the  forest  storm,  or  the  nameless  charms  of  a  beautiful  landscape 
bathed  in  the  golden  purple  of  evening,  or  sleeping  in  the  sacred 
hush"  of  moon-lit  heavens  ;  as  symmetrical  wholes,  perfect  har- 
mony in  thought,  feeling,  music,  or  art,  are  never  described  by 
pen  or  pencil ;  and  the  whole  realm  through  which  nature  is  pour- 
ing her  eternal  anthems,  meets  no  fitting  response  except  in  the 
soul  of  man,  through  whose  enraptured  form  alone,  inspiration 
can  find  any  expression — so,  too,  do  the  difficulties  of  fully  delin- 
eating a  grand*  harmonious  character  increase,  until  a  complete 
portrayal  of  a  man  like  Washington  rises  into  an  impossibility. 

We  can,  indeed,  say  that  in  all  feats  of  agility  and  strength  ; 
litheness  and  grace  of  form ;  in  the  ripened  beauty,  but  half- 
revealed  power  of  the  young  Apollo ;  in  early  training,  by  long 
exposure  in  climbing  mountains,  and  swimming  winter  rivers 
through  creaking  ice-cakes;  working  long  days  under  the  dis- 


FAINT  L1MNINGS. 

solving  heat  of  a  melting  sun,  and  bound  by  the  frozen  chains 
of  arctic  cold,  he  grew  into  a  strength  and  power  of  endurance, 
rarely  seen  even  among  the  men  of  his  time,  who  had  been 
spoiled  by  none  of  the  enervating  caresses  of  tender  mothers,  but 
whom  nature  claimed  as  her  own  hardy  sons  of  the  wilderness, 
whom  she  cradles  in  storms  and  fondles  in  tempests,  as  she  does 
the  eagle  and  the  lion,  whom  she  brings  up  to  do  her  heavy  work 
Nor  is  she  an  unkind  mother.  The  wild  flowers  are  blooming, 
the  wild  birds  are  singing,  and  morning,  with  her  rose-tints,  is 
blushing  over  the  very  chasm  where  her  own  Niagara  is  leaping 
to  its  hell  of  waters.  *  Go  with  that  travelling  sunshine,  till  its 
first  beams  strike  the  Sierra  Nevada,  and  from  its  highest  and 
sheerest  cliff,  the  bird  of  Washington,  with  the  eaglet  on  her 
back,  launches  from  the  dizzy  height,  and  at  mid-heaven,  casts 
off  her  young,  where  it  too  must  learn  to  fly. 

Nor  does  it  help  the  delineation  much  to  speak  of  the  gract 
with  which  Washington  moved  in  the  presence  of  women  of  cul- 
ture and  beauty ;  nor  of  the  majesty  with  which  he  could  not 
help  moving  among  the  great  men  of  his  period  ;  for  nature's  no- 
blemen carry  their  heraldry  emblazoned  on  them ;  her  kings  are 
crowned  from  their  birth.  The  majesty  of  a  great  soul  cannot 
be  painted — it  can  only  be  felt ;  and  with  all  his  gentleness  and 
modesty  of  character,  no  man  ever  left  his  presence  without  a 
feeling  somewhat  akin  to  that  with  which  we  gaze  on  the  ©Id  oak, 
with  its  biography  of  a  thousand  years  written  in  the  fibres  of  its 
gnarled  trunk  ;  or  the  ocean  in  all  the  repose  it  ever  gets  in  its 
eternal  heavings  ;  or  the  inspiring  presence  of  the  blooded  race- 
horse walking  leisurely  out  to  the  course. 

But  a  few  lines,  however  faint,  may  be  traced  here.  The  com- 
mon idea  of  Washington  is  as  wide  of  the  truth,  as  it  is  offensive 


TERRIFIC  ELEMENTS  IN  WASHINGTON'S  CHARACTER. 

in  its  vulgarity.  He  has  been  represented  by  the  feeble  litera- 
ture of  pious  cant,  as  so  impossibly  and  intolerably  good,  that 
he  was  removed  beyond  all  human  infirmity,  or  the  possibility 
of  imitation.  The  imitation  part  might  be  admitted,  with  some 
limitation.  Nor  can  the  essential  goodness  and  moral  purity  of 
his  character  scarcely  be  overdrawn.  But  he  was  entirely  hu- 
man ;  and  it  were  better  to  substitute  the  words  gentleness  and 
tenderness ;  for  his  great  heart  .was  as  sensitive  to  the  softest 
touch,  as  the  old  organ  of  Haarlem  Cathedral  under  the  hand  of 
a  master ;  or  Newton,  when  he  saw  the  ashes  of  his  precious 
manuscripts,  patted  his  favorite  dog  hard,  and  kindly,  as  the 
great  tears  rolled  down,  and  his  frame  shook  with  suffering — 
'  Never  mind,  my  poor  fellow  ;  you  did  not  know  what  you  were 
doing.' 

To  his  dying  day  Major-General  Lee  never  forgot  the  terrible 
curse  his  commander-in-chief  hurled  on  him,  when  he  rode  up 
and  found  him  retreating  from  the  field  of  Monmouth.  In  that 
awful  moment  there  was  no  language  fit  for  the  occasion,  that 
was  not  borrowed  from  the  nomenclature  of  the  Almighty.  He 
who  can  remain  unmoved  in  the  midst  of  such  scenes,  is  less  than 
a  man,  or  more  than  a  god. 

Through  every  fibre  of  that  Herculean  frame — standing  up- 
wards of  six  feet,  developed  into  matchless  and  symmetrical  beau- 
ty— every  passion,  thought,  and  feeling  that  belongs  to  earth  or 
heaven  went  thrilling.  Not  a  nerve  but  waked  to  every  zephyr 
breath  ;  not  a  muscle  of  that  grand  frame  but  was  as  elastic,  not 
a  tendon  that  was  not  as  hard  as  steel.  He  was  of  all  men,  per 
haps,  gifted  with  the  finest  nervous  sensibility,  and  the  mightiest 
power  of  will ;  for  over  the  broad  expanse  of  his  nature,  where 
the  capabilities  of  terrific  action  lay  reposing,  they  woke  to  the 


HIS  GRANDEUR  AND  REVERENCE  OF  SOUL. 

summons  of  that  all-controlling  will,  directed  by  supreme  judg- 
ment, and  arrayed  themselves  for  action,  as  the  divisions  of  an 
army  answer  the  signals  to  come  into  line  of  battle.  It  was  in 
achieving  such  masterly  self-control,  that  he  displayed  a  sub- 
limer  victory  than  'he  who  taketh  a  city.'  If  there  had  been 
nothing  to  master,  where  would  have  been  the  triumph  ? 

There  is  nothing  startling  in  the  solemn  expanse  of  a  great 
prairie,  when  the  eye  can  rest  only  on  the  distant  line  where 
earth  and  heaven  meet.  Uniformity,  calmness,  expanse,  sym- 
metry, harmony — all  these  aspects  of  nature  in  repose — inspire 
us  with  sublimity  only  in  contrast  with  the  thought  of  them  all 
inaction.  There  is  no  silence  so  awful  as  that  which  just  pre- 
cedes the  breaking  of  the  storm.  Even  the  beasts  cower  in  the 
presence  of  that  majestic  hush. 

These  cherry-tree  stories  about  George  Washington  have 
been  told  long  enough.  Such  trivialities,  be  they  the  work  of 
fancy  or  not,  never  help  the  character  of  such  men.  But  the 
earnest  believer  in  the  God  of  Christianity,  finds  a  deep  signifi- 
cance in  the  fact,  that,  in  the  darkest  hours  of  the  Revolutionary 
struggle,  the  half-suppressed  murmur  of  prayer  was  sometimes 
heard  from  the  tent  of  the  commander-in-chief.  There  were 
moments  during  that  great  drama  of  life  and  death,  when  every 
earnest  heart  in  the  nation  was  engaged  in  the  same  business. 
There  are  times  when  the  soul  of  man  can  find  help  nowhere  but 
in  going  to  his  omnipotent  and  loving  Father.  This  is  what  true 
men  understand  by  being  '  made  in  the  image  of  God ;  \  this  is 
what  every  true  Christian  understands  by  prayer.  Woe  be  to  the 
man  who  is  ignorant  of  all  this  !  So  far  is  he  unworthy  of  being 
trusted  with  the  fortunes  of  a  great  people,  the  poor  wretch's 
soil  is  not  safe  in  his  own  keeping.     The  torch-bearers  of  human 


FAAYER  THE  FOUNTAIN  OF  HEROISM. 

hope — the  salvators  of  humanity — the  great  men  who  in  all  the 
ages  have  led  the  human  race  on  to  light  and  victory,  have  been 
reverent  men. 

It  was  by  the  greatest  heroes  of  .Greece,  that  Jupiter's  heaven 
was  oftenest  besieged  by  supplication.  The  Hebrew  lawgiver— 
the  greatest  man  of  antiquity — talked  familiarly  with  God. 
Socrates^  the  intellectual  dictator  of  the  ages,  believed  in  hea- 
venly inspiration,  and  the  Divine  guidance  of  his  guardian  angel. 
The  old  Idumean  Prince — who,  in  the  sublime  allegory  of  Job, 
was  but  a  type  of  what  every  great  soul  must  pass  through  be- 
fore it  can  be  redeemed — was  the  most  reverent  and  illuminated 
interpreter  of  the  Almighty,  of  whom  history  has  left  any  record. 
Worship  of  God,  and  prayer,  and  sacrifice,  was  the  inspiration 
of  the  Roman  legions.  Dependence  upon  Supreme  Power  speaks 
from  every  altar  ever  erected  by  human  hands.  Constantine  was 
invincible  after  he  saw  the  cross  flaming  on  the  sky.  It  was  for 
the  recovery  of  the  tomb  of  the  Saviour,  and  in  the  name  of  the 
Christian's  God,  that  the  armies  of  Saladin  went  down  before  the 
chivalry  of  Europe.  Prayer  was  as  much  the  order  of  the  day 
as  drill,  in  the  army  of  Cromwell.  Everywhere  we  find  that 
the  men  who  pray  best  are  the  hardest  fighters.  The  battle- 
cry  of  '  The  sword  of  the  Lord  and  Gideon '  sent  terror  through, 
the  Assyrian  host.  It  has  been  common  to  sneer  at  the  Puri- 
tans ;  but,  says  Macaulay,  no  man  ever  did  it  who  had  occasion 
to  meet  them  in  the  halls  of  debate,  or  cross  swords  with  them  on 
the  field  of  battle.  Yes,  thank  God,  Washington  was  a  praying 
man. 

We  have  no  knowledge  of  any  great  military  or  political 
leader,  general  or  statesman — or  both  blended  in  one,  as  Wash- 
ington had  to  be — who  had  such  difficulties  to  overcome.  All 
through  the  Revolution,  he  was  cramped  for  means,  munitions, 


HIS  ENORMOUS  TRIALS. 

and  men.  He  scarcely  had  ten  thousand  troops  under  his  com- 
mand on  a  single  field  of  battle.  He  never  had  a  regiment  per- 
fectly equipped,  well-provisioned,  or  promptly  paid. 

He  was  too  great  to  be  fully  understood  by  the  men  under  his 
command,  or  even  by  the  Continental  Congress  itself. 

He  had  to  exhaust  every  resource  to  meet  the  exigencies  of 
every  day.  He  could  not  pave  a  highway  to  victory  over  the 
corpses  of  a  constantly  recruited  army.  He  could  not  risk  all 
upon  any  one  movement  His  history  is  illuminated  only  by 
occasional  flashes  of  brilliant  victory 

"  Half  his  title  to  military  glory,  like  Xenophon's,  lies  in  con- 
ducting masterly  retreats.  Destiny  itself  compelled  him  to  be  a 
Fabius,  while  nature  had  endowed  him  with  the  elements  of  the 
boldest  and  most  heroic  generalship. 

(3-reat  as  was  his  humanity,  necessity  forced  him  to  hold  on 
to .  every  life  with  the  grasp  of  a  drowning  man ;  every  grain  of 
powder,  and  ounce  of  lead,  or  scrap  of  subsistence,  he  hoarded 
with  the  greed  of  a  miser. 

There  were  petty  jealousies  and  small  ambitions ;  there  was  all 
the  malignity  of  envy,  and  the  ill-suppressed  discontent  of  selfish 
and  mean  natures ;  there  were  even  conspiracies  in  his  camp  ; 
there  was  dissatisfaction  in  Congress  ;  there  was  groundless  ap- 
prehension of  dictatorial  power. 

He  lived  in  a  world  of  trial  and  trouble ;  and  in  the  silent  suf- 
ferings of  his  own  heart,  he  went  through  such  anguish  as  none 
but  great  souls  ever  know 


WEBSTER'S  TRIBUTE   TO   WASHINGTON. 

But  he  was  equal  to  every  trial.'  His  faith  bore  him  up  whei 
all  other  supports  gave  way  ;  nor  is  it  irreverent  if  we  apply  tc 
him,  while  he  was  passing  through  that  fearful  ordeal,  the  words 
which  the  beholder  used  when  he  looked  into  the  fiery  furnace 
where  the  three  Hebrew  victims  had  been  cast  by  a  heathen  king, 
'I  see  one  walking  with  them  like  unto  the  Son  of  Man.' 

[The  following  words  could  have  fallen  only  from  the  lips  of 
Daniel  Webster  : — We  are  at  the  point  of  a  century  from  the  birth 
of  Washington ;  and  what  a  century  it  has  been  !  During  its 
course  the  human  mind  has  seemed  to  proceed  with  a  sort  of  geo- 
metric velocity,  accomplishing  for  human  intelligence  and  human 
freedom,  more  than  had  been  done  in  fives  or  tens  of  centuries  pre- 
ceding. Washington  stands  at  the  commencement  of  a  new  era  as 
well  as  at  the  head  of  the  New  World.  A  century  from  the  birth 
of  Washington  has  changed  the  world.  The  country  of  Washing- 
ton has  been  the  theatre  on  which  a  great  part  of  that  change  has 
been  wrought ;  and  Washington  himself  a  principal  agent  by 
which  it  has  been  accomplished.  His  age  and  his  country  are 
equally  full  of  wonders :  and  of  both  he  is  the  chief. 

I  claim  him  for  America.  In  all  the  perils,  in  every  darkened 
moment  of  the  State,  in  the  midst  of  the  reproaches  of  ene- 
mies, and  the  misgiving  of  friends,  I  turn  to  that  transcendent 
name  for  courage  and  for  consolation.  To  him  who  denies  or 
doubts  whether  our  fervid  liberty  can  be  combined  with  law, 
with  order,  with  the  security  of  property,  with  the  pursuits  and 
advancement  of  happiness  ;  to  him  who  denies  that  our  forms  of 
government  are  capable  of  producing  exaltation  of  soul,  and  .the 
passion  of  true  glory  ;  to  him  who  denies  that  we  have  contrib- 
uted anything  to  the  stock  of  great  lessons  and  great  examples ; 
to  all  these  I  reply  by  pointing  to  Washington !] 


THE  FA  THER'S  LAST  LEG  A  CY. 

'In  looking  forward  to  the  moment,  which  is  intended  to 
terminate  the  career  of  my  public  life,  my  feelings  do  not  permit 
me  to  suspend  the  deep  acknowledgment  of  that  debt  of  grati- 
tude, which  I  owe  to  my  beloved  country  for  the  many  honors  it 
has  conferred  upon  me  ;  still  more  for  the  steadfast  confidence 
with  which  it  has  supported  me  ;  and  for  the  opportunities  I 
have  thence  enjoyed  of  manifesting  my  inviolable  attachment,  by 
services  faithful  and  persevering,  though  in  usefulness  unequal 
to  my  zeal.  If  benefits  have  resulted  to  our  country  from  these 
services,  let  it  always  be  remembered  to  your  praise,  and  as  an 
instructive  example "  in  our  annals,  that  under  circumstances  in 
which  the  passions,  agitated  in  every  direction,  were  liable  to 
mislead,  amidst  appearances  sometimes  dubious,  vicissitudes  of 
fortune  often  discouraging,  in  situations  in  which  not  unfre- 
quently  want  of  success  has  countenanced  the  spirit  of  criticism  ; 
the  constancy  of  your  support  was  the  essential  prop  of  the 
efforts,  and  a  guarantee  of  the  plans  by  which  they  were  effected. 
Profoundly  penetrated  with  this  idea,  I  shall  carry  it  with  me  to 
my  grave,  as  a  strong  incitement  to  unceasing  vows  that  Heaven 
may  continue  to  you  the  choicest  tokens  of  its  beneficence ;  that 
your  union  and  brotherly  affection  may  be  perpetual ;  that  the 
free  constitution,  which  is  the  work  of  your  hands,  may  be 
sacredly  maintained  :  that  its  administration  in  every  depart- 
ment may  be  stamped  with  wisdom  and  virtue  ;  that,  in  fine,  the 
happiness  of  the  people  of  these  States,  under  the  auspices  of 
liberty,  may  be  made  complete,  by  so  careful  a  preservation  and 
so  prudent  a  use  of  this  blessing,  as  will  acquire  to  them  the 
glory  of  recommending  it  to  the  applause,  the  affection,  and 
adoption  of  every  nation,  which  is  yet  a  stranger  to  it.' —  Wash- 
ington^ s  Fareioell  Address. 


Of  Till 

UNIVERSITY 


LESTER'S     VsSjugjjjsfc, 

HISTORY  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


FIRST   PERIOD. 
1492 — 1776. 

DISCOVERY  AND  COLONIZATION, 


SECTION   FIRST. 

DISCOVERIES. 


The  New  World  was  discovered  just  at  the  right  time.  Whether  the  old 
Sagas  which  the  blue-eyed  Norsemen  rehearsed,  of  the  discovery  of  America 
five  hundred  years  before  Columbus,  were  truthful  legends  of  Viking  hero- 
ism and  Scandinavian  adventure,  or  not,  is  of  very  little  consequence,  since 
mankind  were  not  ready  to  make  any  use  of  the  fact.  Europe  had  not  yet 
woke  from  the  long  night  of  the  Dark  Ages.  The  First  Crusade  for  the 
recovery  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  had  not  been  proclaimed.  The  only  copy 
in  existence  of  the  Pandects  of  Justinian,  still  lay  hid  away  in  a  Roman  ruin 
at  Amain.  Hardly  a  score  of  complete  copies  of  the  Bible  were  in  the  pos- 
session of  the  human  race.  The  treacherous  variations  of  the  Mariner's 
Compass  were  unknown  and  uncalculated.  The  Telescope  had  not  been 
invented.  The  scholars  of  the  Eastern  Empire  had  not  yet  fled  from  the 
falling  towers  of  Constantinople  with  their  priceless  scrolls  of  ancient  learning. 
The  art  of  Printing,  which  was  to  secure  civilization  for  all  coming  time,  had 
not  yet  been  discovered.  The  deep  shadow  of  barbarism  hung  heavy  over 
the  earth.  Whatever  had  been  known  of  art  or  science,  by  the  polished 
nations  of  antiquity,  was  buried  under  the  rubbish  of  dead  centuries.  The 
Revival  of  Letters,  which  brought  with  it  the  emancipation  of  the  human 
mind,  had  not  yet  colored  the  dream  of  a  single  scholar  !  What  could 
Europe  have  done  with  a  New  World  ? 

We  date  from  a  well-known  event — the  greatest  since  the  birth  of  the  Sav- 
iour ;  nor  shall  we  dwell  upon  it,  since  the  imperishable  record  of  our 
beloved  Irving  has  made  any  other  attempt  to  repeat  the  recital,  not  only 
unnecessary,  but  hopeless. 

Columbus. — October  12,  1492. — On  the  evening  of  October  II,  1492,  the 
land-breezes  came  to  Columbus  and  his  little  fleet,  loaded  with  the  perfumes 
of  the  tropics.     Through  the  growing  light  of  the  next  morning,  his  weary 


2  VOYAGES  AND  DISCOVERIES  OF  THE  CABOTS, 

eyes  were  greeted  by  the  sight  of  waving  forest  trees  ;  the  song  of  birds  fell 
on  his  ear ;  and  he  heard  those  gladdest  of  all  sounds,  human  voices,  which 
told  him  he  had  found  the  New  Land  he  was  seeking,  and  that  it  was 
inhabited.  He  landed,  and  calling  the  little  island  by  the  dearest  name  he 
could  invoke,  he  unfurled  over  San  Salvador  the  castles,  and  lions,  of  Cas- 
tile, and  Leon — the  standard  of  Spain — and  took  possession  in  the  name  of 
Ferdinand  and  Isabella. 

John  Cabot. — March  5,  1496. — It  had  been  the  desire  of  Columbus  to 
undertake  his  grand  voyage  to  the  Indies  under  the  auspices  of  England- 
He  had  in  his  early  days  sailed  by  the  British  Islands  in  his  adventurous 
expeditions  to  the  Northern  seas  ;  but  when  his  triumphant  return  from  his 
first  voyage  had  filled  the  maritime  nations  with  transports  of  amazement  and 
enthusiasm,  Henry  VII.,  who  had  opened  a  new  period  of  prosperity  for 
England,  by  the  overthrow  of  Richard  in  the  battle  of  Bosworth  field,  where 
he  won  his  crown,  lent  a  willing  ear  to  the  proposal  of  John  Cabot, 
the  great  Venetian  navigator,  for  a  voyage  of  discovery  to  the  west.  Ac 
cordingly,  on  the  5th  of  March,  1496,  less  than  four  years  after  Columbus' 
first  discovery,  Cabot  received  a  patent  under  the  Great  Seal,  commissioning 
him  and  his  three  sons,  Lewis,  Sebastian,  and  Sancius,  or  either  of  them, 
their  heirs  or  their  deputies,  to  sail  with  five  ships  "  under  the  royal  banners 
and  ensigns,  to  all  parts,  countries,  and  seas,  of  the  east,  of  the  west,  and  of 
the  north,  and  to  seek  out  and  discover  what  soever  isles,  countries,  regions  and 
provinces,  in  what  part  of  the  world  soever  they  might  be,  which  before  this 
time  had  been  unknown  to  Christians."  In  "this  most  ancient  American 
State  paper  of  England,"  the  King  gave  them  further  license  "  to  set  up  the 
royal  banners  and  ensigns  in  the  countries,  places,  or  mainland  newly  found 
by  them,  and  to  conquer,  occupy  and  possess  them  as  his  vassals  and  lieuten- 
ants." The  patentees  received  no  assistance  in  arming  and  furnishing  their 
vessels ;  they  were  required  on  every  return  voyage,  to  land  at  the  port  of 
Bristol  and  pay  to  the  King  a  fifth  part  of  the  proceeds  of  the  expedition. 
But  his  fleet '  could  not  be  got  ready  for  sea  till  May  of  the  following  year. 

The  Cabots.—June  24,  1497. — Standing  on  the  deck  of  a  British  vessel, 
bearing  the  royal  standard  of  England,  with  his  young  son  Sebastian  at  his 
side,  the  great  navigator,  John  Cabot,  first  saw  through  the  morning  mists 
"  the  dismal  cliffs  of  Labrador."  This  was  nearly  fourteen  months  before 
Columbus,  on  his  third  voyage,  came  in  sight  of  the  mainland  of  South 
America.  The  continent  of  North  America  hereafter  belonged  to  English 
men  by  right  of  discovery.  Sailing  along  the  coast  many  leagues  without 
the  sight  of  a  human  being,  but  observing  that  the  country  was  inhabited, 

1  Onlv  a  few  fragments  of  this  voyage,  or  of  the  his-  [Matthew]  ;  that  she  was  the  first  vessel  that  touched 

tory  of   John   Cabot   himself,  have  been  preserved,  our  American  shores,  and  the  only  one  that  returned 

His  fleet  is  believed  to  have  consisted  of  four  vessels.  It  in  safety  to  Bristol. 
is  certain  that  the  Admiral's  ship  was  called  Matteo 


THE  MEMORABLE  YEAR  OF  DISCOVERY,  1498.  3 

he  landed  and  planted  a  large  cross  with  the  standard  of  England,  and  by  its 
side  the  Venetian  banner  of  St.  Mark — the  one  in  loyalty  to  his  King,  Henry 
VII.;  the  other  in  affection  for  Venice,  his  beloved  Queen  of  the  Adriatic. 
From  that  hour  the  fortunes  of  this  continent  were  to  be  swayed  by  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race. 

Hardly  three  months  had  passed  after  Cabot's  expedition  sailed  from  Bris- 
tol, before  his  good  ship  Matteo  let  go  her  anchor  again  in  the  same  harbor. 
The  joyful  news  spread  through  all  England ;  the  King  showed  the  discoverer 
distinguished  honors,  put  into  his  hand  a  purse  of  gold,1  and  encouraged 
him  to  continue  his  career.  He  dressed  in  silk,  and  was  everywhere  greeted 
as  "the  great  Admiral."  From  every  quarter,  seafaring  men,  including  many 
of  his  Italian  countrymen,  pressed  to  enter  his  service.  Under  more  favor- 
able auspices,  he  prepared  for  a  second  voyage  which  he  was  never  to  make, 
and  with  the  knowledge  of  this  fact,  all  traces  of  him  disappear.  When  he 
died,  or  where  he  was  buried,  we  have  no  account. 

Sebastian  Cabot,  May,  1498. — Whatever  may  have  been  the  fate  of  his 
father,  nothing  dampened  the  ardor  of  young  Sebastian,  who,  in  the  latter  part 
of  May,  1498,  sailed  with  two  ships,  and  as  large  a  company  of  volunteers  as 
he  desired,  determined  to  find  the  north-west  passage  to  Cathay,  and  Japan ; 
since  all  the  lands  either  his  father,  or  Columbus  had  yet  discovered,  were  re- 
garded only  as  outlying  islands  of  the  Asiatic  coast. 

The  memorable  year  1498.  — This  was  one  of  the  most  memorable  years  in 
the  history  of  discovery.  Columbus,  still  fired  by  his  fervid  zeal  to  reach  the 
Indies,  and  win  for  his  King  their  inexhaustible  treasures,  and  convert  their 
swarming  millions  to  the  worship  of  God, — thus  securing  glory  on  earth,  and 
Paradise  hereafter, — had,  during  the  same  month  that  Cabot  left  Bristol,  sailed 
on  his  third  voyage,  in  which  he  was  to  discover  the  continent  of  South  Amer- 
ica, and  be  brought  home  a  prisoner  in  chains. 

Vasco  da  Gama. — During  that  same  month,  too,  Vasco  da  Gama,  another 
young  ocean  crusader,  was  doubling  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  clearing  the 
Straits  of  Mozambique,  and  by  going  eastward  reaching  the  very  land  which 
the  other  navigators  were  searching  for  in  the  west.  That  year  of  1498  was 
to  open  new  paths  for  the  commerce  of  the  worlc,  and  add  immeasurably  to 
Ihe  wealth  of  Europe. 

Of  course,  Cabot  missed  the  discovery  of  tne  north-west  passage.  But 
after  leaving  Newfoundland,  where  his  discoveries  of  the  great  cod-fishing 
grounds  were  to  enrich  the  world,  he  carefully  explored  the  coast  line  of  the 
United  States  as  far  south  as  the  Chesapeake. 

Sebastian  Cabot  long  lived  to  enjoy  his  honors.  On  the  death  of  Henry 
VII. ,  he  was  invited  to  Spain  by  Ferdinand,  where  he  was  made  Chief  Pilot 

*  We  learn  the  date  of  Cabot's  return  from  the  fol-    dated  August  10,  1407  :  "  I  have  given  a  reward  often 
low  ng  entry  in  the  privy  purse  accounts  of  Henry  VII.,    pounds  to  hyrn  that  found  the  new  isle." 


4  IRREPRESSIBLE  SPIRIT  OF  ADVENTURE. 

of  the  Kingdom.  After  a  voyage  to  South  America  under  a  commission 
from  young  Charles  V..  he  returned  to  England,  and  was  pensioned  for  his 
services.  "  He  lived  to  an  extreme  old  age,  and  so  loved  his  profession  to 
the  last,  that,  in  the  hour  of  death,  his  wandering  thoughts  were  upon  the 
ocean.  The  discoverer  of  the  territory  of  our  country  was  one  of  the  most 
extraordinary  men  of  his  day.  There  is  deep  reason  for  regret  that  time  has 
spared  so  few  memorials  of  his  career.  Himself  incapable  of  jealousy,  he 
did  not  escape  detraction.  He  gave  England  a  continent,  and  no  one  knows 
his  burial-place."  l 

Portugal,  1501. — Important  discoveries  were  made  by  Portugal,  besides 
those  of  Vasco  da  Gama ;  but  none  in  North  America.  The  nearest  ap- 
proach to  it  was  in  the  summer  of  1501.  Gasper  Cortoreal  coasted  along 
the  shores  of  Labrador  several  hundred  miles,  and  finding  no  other  profitable 
cargo,  stole  upwards  of  fifty  of  the  native  Indians,  and  returning  home,  sold 
them  for  slaves.  The  Portuguese  having  already  made  men  articles  of  traffic, 
Cortoreal  sailed  for  another  cargo,  from  which,  blessed  be  God,  he  never  re- 
turned. Cortoreal  might  perhaps  be  considered  as  having, — through  some 
of  his  countrymen  who  sixty  years  later  settled  in  Newfoundland  and  Nova 
Scotia, — performed  a  work  of  supererogation  for  his  human  thefts,  by  their 
having  first  introduced  cattle  and  swine  into  those  regions. 

The  wars  which  ended  in  the  fall  of  Grenada,  and  the  expulsion  of  the 
Moors  from  Spain,"  had  left  a  large  army  of  soldiers  who  had  filled  Europe 
with  their  fame,  and  most  of  them  were  ready  for  any  new  field  of  adventure. 
Cavaliers  who  had  achieved  such  deeds  of  valor  during  the  Moorish  wars, 
soon  grew  discontented  in  the  listlessness  of  the  Court  of  Ferdinand,  or 
found  idleness  and  solitude  intolerable  in  their  mountain  castles.  In  exter- 
minating the  enemies  of  the  faith,  a  spirit  of  religious  zeal,  darkened  by  the 
superstitious  bigotry  that  seemed  to  be  congenial  with  the  Spanish  character, 
and  clouded  withal  by  a  fondness  for  blood,  found  no  vent  except  in  dream- 
ing of  new  conquests ;  and  their  eyes  were  directed  towards  the  west.  The 
four  voyages  of  Columbus  and  his  companions,  with  the  belief  everywhere  pre 
vailing  that  they  were  on  the  path  to  the  discovery  of  the  fabled  Eldorado, 
took  such  complete  possession  of  the  Spanish  mind,  that  at  no  period  had 
been  witnessed  such  irrepressible  enthusiasm.  Expeditions  were  continually 
being  fitted  out,  and  the  whole  drift  of  enterprise  and  adventure  was  towards 
the  setting  sun. 

1  "The  fame  of  Columbus  was  soon  embalmed  in  the  low  coast  of  Guiana.    But  England  acquired  through 

the  poetry  of  Tasso  ;  Da  Gama  is  the  hero  of  the  na-  their  energy  such  a  right  to  North  America,  as  this  un- 

tional  epic  of  Portugal ;  but  the  elder  Cabot  was  so  little  disputable  priority  could  confer.      The  successors  of 

celebrated,  that  even  the  reality  of  his  voyage  has  been  Henry  VII.  recognized  the  claims  of  Spain  and  Portu- 

denied  ;  and  Sebastian  derived  neither  benefit  nor  im-  gal  only  so  far  as  they  actually  occupied  the  territories 

mediate  renown  from  his  expedition.     His  main  object  to  which  they  laid  pretension  ;  and  at  a  later  day.  the 

had  been  the  discovery  of  a  north-western  passage  to  English  Parliament  and  the  English  courts  derived  a 

Asia,  and  in  this  respect  his  voyage  was  a  failure ;  title,  founded,  not  upon  occupancy,  but  upon  the  award 

while  Gama  was  cried  up  by  all  the  world  for  having  of  a  Roman  Pontiff." — Bancroft's  U.  S.,  22d  ed.,  vol. 

found  the  way  by  the  south-east.     For  the  next  half  i.  p.  14. 

century  it  was  hardly  borne  in  mind  that  the  Venetian  a  Here,  too,  Irving  has  left  us  the  most  charming 

and  his  son  had,  in  two  successive  voyages,  reached  the  account  of  that  bloody  and  heroic  struggle,  in  his  "  Con- 

continent  of  North  America  before  Columbus  came  upon  quest  of  Grenada." 


SEARCH  FOR  THE  ELIXIR  OF  LIFE— FLORIDA.  5 

Balboa,  15 10. — In  15 10,  Balboa  settled  upon  the  Isthmus  of  Darien,  and 
there  planted  the  first  colony  on  the  American  continent.  Bent,  as  all  these 
adventurers  were,  first  of  all,  on  the  discovery  of  gold,  it  was  in  the  searcl 
of  it  that,  three  years  after  his  landing,  Balboa,  from  the  top  of  a  high  moun- 
tain, discovered  the  Pacific  Ocean,  which  he  called  the  South  Sea.  He  de- 
scended the  mountain,  and  in  full  costume  entered  the  waters,  and  planted 
the  Spanish  flag,  taking  possession  of  the  new-found  sea.1 

Juan  Ponce  de  Leon,  March  27,  15 13. — Juan  Ponce  de  Leon  had  gained 
a  great  reputation  for  valor  in  the  wars  of  Granada,  and  he  was  allowed  to 
accompany  Columbus  on  his  second  voyage.  He  was  rewarded  for  his 
gallant  military  services  in  the  conquest  of  Cuba,  with  the  government  of  the 
eastern  portion  of  the  Island  which  is  now  so  valiantly  attempting  to  cast 
off  the  yoke  of  his  successors.  The  neighboring  island  of  Porto  Rico,  with 
its  fascinating  shores,  excited  his  cupidity,  and  he  was  appointed  to  its  govern- 
ment, where  by  the  most  grinding  oppression  of  its  natives,  he  soon  became 
opulent.  But  he  was  early  obliged  to  resign,  when  he  cast  about  for  some 
new  field  where  he  might  found  a  kingdom  of  his  own.  He  was  now  a 
scarred  old  soldier,  and  having,  like  most  of  even  the  intelligent  spirits  of 
his  age,  participated  in  the  belief  of  the  truthfulness  of  the  tradition  which 
located  the  Fountains  of  perpetual  youth  in  the  New  World,  and  in  hopes  of 
its  discovery,  he  sailed  from  Porto  Rico  with  a  squadron  of  three  vessels, 
fitted  out  at  his  own  expense,  on  a  voyage  to  Fairy  Land,  in  search  of  the 
Elixir  of  Life.  Not  finding  it  at  Guanahani,  nor  among  the  Bahama  Islands, 
he  pursued  his  voyage  to  the  west. 

Florida,  March  27, 15 13. — On  Easter  Sunday  morning — thePascua  Florida 
of  the  Spaniards — he  gained  the  first  sight  of  our  Italian  peninsula  ;  and 
touching  its  golden  sands  on  the  spot  near  where  St.  Augustine  stands,  and 
finding  himself  surrounded  by  the  flowers  and  verdure  of  early  spring,  he 
planted  the  ensign  of  Spain,  and  gave  the  beautiful  land  the  name  of  Florida. 
But  it  was  a  dear  discovery.  Finding  no  Elixir  Fountain  for  the  ills  of  age, 
he  returned  disappointed  to  Porto  Rico  ;  but  he  was  rewarded  by  his  sovereign 
with  the  government  of  Florida,  attended  with  the  condition  of  colonizing  it. 
Seven  years  went  by  before  he  could  complete  his  preparations,  when  be 
sailed  with  two.  ships  to  take  possession  of  his  new  province,  and  choose  a 
site  for  his  colony. 

Lucas  Vasquez  de  Ayllon. — But  during  the  interval,  while  he  was  absent 
in  Europe,  some  of  the  wealthy  owners  of  mines  and  plantations  in  San 
Domingo,  sent  Lucas  Vasquez  de  Ayllon,  with  two  slave-ships,  to  seize  the 
natives  of  the  Bermudas,  and  carry  them  away.  But  they  were  driven  by  a 
storm  into  St.  Helen's  Sound  on  the  coast  of  South  Carolina,  where  they 
anchored  at  the  mouth  of  the  Combahee  river. 

1  Through  jealousy  of  his  fame,  his  fellow-adventurers  brought  accusations  against  him  and  put  him  M 
death  in  15 17. 


6  FIRST  ROBBERY  OF  MEN  ON  AMERICAN  SOIL. 

The  simple  natives  of  these  new  lands  had  not  yet  learned  to  distrust 
white  adventurers,  and  discovering  no  signs  of  hostility,  they  received  them 
on  landing  with  the  most  generous  hospitality.  Their  fears  being  allayed, 
they  returned  the  visit,  bringing  with  them  all  their  arms  full  of  peace- 
offerings  ;  and  under  those  fair  southern  heavens,  the  sun  was  shining  upon 
what  seemed  one  of  the  most  beautiful  scenes  yet  enacted  on  the  earth. 
These  Europeans,  clothed  in  the  gorgeous  costume  of  Spain,  and  living  in 
what  must  have  seemed  to  the  rude  children  of  the  forest  floating  palaces  ; 
surrounded  by  implements  of  power  and  beauty,  they  looked  up  to  their 
strange  visitors  with  awe,  and  believed  them  to  be  the  children  of  the  Great 
Spirit.  But  this  fair  illusion  was  soon  to  be  dispelled,  and  a  great  crime 
perpetrated,  which  could  be  atoned  for  only  by  four  centuries  of  blood- 
thirsty vengeance.  In  the  midst  of  this  vision  of  enchantment  and  festivity, 
and  when  the  betrayed  Indians  had  been  seduced  below,  the  hatches  were 
closed,  all  sails  set,  and  the  expedition  started  for  San  Domingo.  The 
wails  of  the  helpless  captives  were  heard  over  the  water,  and  answered  by 
screams  of  terror  and  agony  from  wives,  mothers,  parents,  and  children,  on 
the  shore ! 

From  that  hour,  the  terrible  news  went  quickly  through  the  forest,  from  wig- 
wam to  wigwam,  and  village  to  village,  until  ere  long,  the  maddening  tale  of 
treachery  had  reached  the  most  distant  tribe  in  North  America ;  thus  sowing 
in  the  bosoms  of  the  Red  Men  the  seeds  of  implacable  hate  that  were  to  bear 
such  baleful  fruit  in  coming  ages. 

In  the  impotency  of  the  victims,  Heaven  itself  became  their  avenger.  He 
who  had  told  the  white  man  "  Vengeance  is  mine,"  made  good  the  declaration. 
One  of  the  ships  foundered  at  sea  ;  and  in  the  other,  nearly  every  prisoner  re- 
fused food,  and  died.  Vasquez  did  indeed  effect  his  escape  ;  and  after  reach- 
ing Spain,  boasted  of  his  expedition.  The  young  Prince  Charles  V.,  who  had 
just  mounted  the  throne  of  Spain,  was  deceived  by  the  misrepresentations, 
and  the  kidnapper  was  appointed  to  the  conquest  of  Chicora, — a  name  given 
to  the  coast  of  South  Carolina, — which  had  thus  been  desecrated  by  a  crime 
too  vast  for  the  comprehension  of  its  simple  inhabitants. 

But  fortune  steadily  withheld  her  favors  from  the  design.  After  exhaust- 
ing his  entire  fortune  in  its  preparation,  his  largest  ship  was  wiecked  on 
entering  the  Combahee  river.  Most  of  his  men  were  killed  by  the  natives, 
and  the  commander  himself  barely  escaped  with  his  life.  Thus  ended  his 
career. 

Meantime,  Ponce  de  Leon  was  to  pay  his  share  of  the  penalty  for  the  crime 
committed  by  Vasquez  on  the  Carolina  coast.  He  had  no  sooner  landed, 
than  the  Indians  fell  upon  him  with  maddened  fury.  Many  of  the  company 
were  slain,  and  Ponce  de  Leon,  pierced  by  an  arrow,  was  borne  off  to  the 
fleet  by  his  fugitive  companions.  Thus  the  soldier  who  had  mingled  his  shouts 
with  the  victorious  chivalry  of  Spain  over  fallen  Grenada,  lay  in  his  cabin 
dying  ;  his  kingdom  unfounded  ;  his  fountain  of  perpetual  youth  undiscovered  ' 
but  the  Indian  not  left  unavenged. 


MAGNIFICENT  EXPEDITION  OF  DE  SOTO.  7 

Fernando  Cortez,  152 1. — We  leave  untold  the  wonderful  expedition  of  Fer- 
nando Cortez,  his  conquest  of  the  Empire  of  the  Montezumas,  and  the 
brilliant  honors  that  awaited  him  on  returning  to  his  country. 

Ferdinand  JDe  Soto.—~ This  great  but  unfortunate  man  had  been  one  of  the 
bravest  of  Pizarro's  companions  in  his  expedition  to  Peru,  and  on  his  triumphant 
reception  in  Spain,  had  received  in  marriage  the  hand  of  the  daughter  of  a  dis- 
tinguished nobleman  whom  he  had  once  served  as  a  poor  adventurer.  He 
persuaded  his  benignant  Sovereign,  Charles  V.,  that  away  in  the  heart  of  the 
Northern  Continent,  cities  and  kingdoms  could  be  found,  as  splendid  as  those  of 
Mexico  and  Peru.  All  the  favors  he  asked  for  were  granted.  He  was  made 
Commander  of  Cuba,  with  supreme  authority  over  the  whole  continental  region 
that  stretched  to  the  north,  which  was  designated  by  the  term  Florida. 

When  his  expedition  was  announced,  it  stirred  all  the  enthusiasm  of  a  new 
crusade.  The  minds  of  men  had  grown  wild,  and  the  fever  for  gold  and  gems 
was  burning  in  every  Spanish  vein.  The  nobility,  the  chivalry,  and  the 
heroism  of  the  whole  peninsula,  flocked  to  join  the  expedition.  Men  sold 
their  estates  and  family  jewels  to  fit  themselves  out.  From  this  vast  array, 
De  Soto  chose  six  hundred  men,  all  of  them  clothed  in  brilliant  costumes,  and 
glittering  in  polished  armor.  The  day  of  sailing  was  as  gay  as  a  festival ;  and 
never,  perhaps,  before  nor  since,  has  been  seen  a  similar  spectacle  so  gorgeous. 

May,  1539. — His  reception  at  Cuba  was  worthy  of  a  conqueror.  Leav- 
ing his  wife  in  the  government  of  the  Island,  he  sailed  for  his  destination  with  a 
fleet  of  ten  vessels,  and  fourteen  days  later  anchored  in  the  Bay  of  Spiritu  Santo 

June  10. — The  expedition  disembarked  with  three  hundred  blooded  horses 
of  Andalusia,  and  under  the  mid-day  sun,  flashing  from  burnished  armoi 
and  golden  trappings,  the  six  hundred  passed  in  review  before  their  com- 
mander, presenting  what  must  have  been  to  the  eyes  of  their  doomed  Indian 
spectators  gazing  on  them  from  the  neighboring  forest,  the  strangest  and  most 
imposing  sight  ever  presented  on  the  soil  of  the  New  World. 

The  gay  and  gorgeous  cavalcade  began  their  march  to  those  unknown  em- 
pires in  the  far  interior,  whose  cities  flashed  with  gems,  and  whose  streets  were 
paved  with  gold.  As  they  looked  back,  they  saw  their  returning  fleet  fading  away 
over  the  waters,  and  they  knew  that  they  were  either  to  return  loaded  with  wealth 
and  covered  with  honor,  or  to  leave  their  bones  bleaching  in  the  wilderness. 

The  expedition  was  supposed  to  be  thoroughly  prepared  for  any  emergency. 
Their  numbers  and  equipments,  exceeded  the  expeditions  of  Cortez,  and 
Pizarro,  under  which  the  empires  of  the  Montezumas  and  the  Incas  had  so 
easily  fallen.  Their  armor  and  implements  of  war  embraced  everything 
known  for  conquest.  They  carried  supplies  of  iron  and  steel,  with  blacksmiths' 
and  armorers'  forges,  chains  for  captives,  and  trained  bloodhounds  as  auxiliaries. 
They  had  abundant  stores  of  provisions,  with  whole  droves  of  swine,  brought 
with  them  to  spread  through  the  forest.     The  expedition  had  every  attribute 


&  DE  SOTO  DISCOVERS  THE  MISSISSIPPI. 

of  a  holy  crusade,  including  twelve  priests,  with  all  the  emblems  and  insignia 
of  the  altar  in  the  service  of  mass.  The  benedictions  of  Heaven  were  to 
crown  the  crusade  of  the  chivalry  of  Spain. 

Many  a  brilliant  pen,  and  the  pencil  of  a  great  artist '  have  here  come 
to  the  service  of  history.  We  can  give  no  account  of  the  expedition.  With 
De  Soto's  entrancing  but  sad  record,  most  of  my  readers  are  already  familiar. 
Encountering  the  fierce  Mobilien  tribes,  wasting  by  disease,  or  falling  by  the 
deadly  arrows  of  the  Indians,  betrayed  by  captive  guides,  encountering  swol- 
len rivers  and  impenetrable  morasses,  they  dragged  out  a  winter  in  the  land 
of  the  Chickasaws.  Deluded  still  with  the  idea  of  gold,  they  followed  an 
Indian  guide  as  far  north  as  the  gold  region  of  North  Carolina  the  following 
spring,  till,  decimated  in  numbers,  broken  in  spirit,  they  reached  the  Missis- 
sippi, probably  at  the  lowest  Chickasaw  bluff,  making  this  grand  discovery, 
where,  after  a  long  detention  in  the  construction  of  barges,  they  crossed  the 
mighty  stream  to  its  western  bank.  Here  De  Soto  erected  a  cross,  made  of 
a  huge  pine  tree,  and  in  the  presence  of  nearly  twenty  thousand  red  men, 
the  worship  of  God  was  witnessed,  and  the  name  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  heard 
for  the  first  time.  He  pushed  on  his  fruitless  explorations  almost  to  the 
sources  of  the  Red  River,  and  as  far  north  as  the  wilds  of  Southern  Missouri, 
returning  finally  to  the  banks  of  the  mighty  stream  he  had  first  brought  to  the 
knowledge  of  civilized  men. 

But  the  discoverer  of  the  Mississippi  had  at  last  to  succumb  to  obstacles 
too  great  for  him  to  conquer.  The  spirit  of  his  remaining  companions  ut- 
terly broken,  and  surrounded  by  innumerable  hordes  of  wild  and  revengeful 


1  I  refer  to  The  Discovery  of  the  Mississippi  by 
De  Soto,  one  of  the  paintings  representing  events  which 
have  occurred  on  this  continent,  which  fill  the  eight  pan- 
els in  the  Rotunda  of  the  Capitol.  Among  sixty  com- 
petitors, Mr.  William  H.  Powell,  the  youngest  of  all,  re- 
ceived the  commission,  by  a  vote  of  198  out  of  212  in 
the  House  of  Representatives. 

There  are  five  great  groups  in  the  picture.  On  the 
right  side,  in  the  foreground,  is  a  company  of  stalwart 
men  planting  a  gigantic  Cross.  The  ceremony  is  per- 
formed in  the  presence  of  twenty  thousand  Indians, 
who  witnessed  for  the  first  time  a  Christian  act  of  wor- 
ship. The  censer  is  held  by  an  ecclesiastic,  and  as  he 
waves  it,  the  old  priest,  whose  beard  comes  down  al- 
most to  the  sacred  book  he  holds,  plants  the  Tree  of 
Salvation  amidst  the  solitudes  of  the  west.  The  hercu- 
lean man  who  has  dug  the  hole,  is  resting  from  his 
labor,  looking  with  earnestness  and  solemnity  upon  this 
act  of  reverence  and  devotion. 

At  the  left  corner  in  the  foreground,  is  a  correspond- 
ing group,  in  which  a  cannon  is  being  dragged  up  by 
the  artillerymen  ;  for  the  cross  was  always  planted  in 
new  regions  by  the  Spaniards,  with  incense  from  the 
priest,  and  smoke  from  the  cannon  of  the  soldier. 

In  the  centre  of  the  foreground  is  a  massive  camp- 
chest,  with  arms,  helmets,  breast-plates,  and  all  the 
implements  of  war  thrown  carelessly  around.  Every 
article  is  a  study,  from  the  exact  models  of  the  period. 
In  the  centre  of  the  picture  sits  De  Soto,  on  a  magnifi- 
cent Arab  horse,  which  was  a  portrait  carefully  drawn 
of  Abdel-Kader's  battle  horse,  the  animal  being,  at  the 
time  the  painting  was  executed,  in  the  Imperial  stables 
at  St.  Cloud. 

The  attitude  of  De  Soto  is  sublime,  for  it  is  natural. 
It  is  an  earnest,  comprehensive  gaze  at  the  great  river. 
In  the  fourth  group  we  see  beautiful  Indian  lodges,  rising 
up  into  the  soft  atmosphere  with  an  almost  Moslem  sweet- 
ness, with  I  idians  of  all  ages  and  both  sexes,  standing 
near  them.    Two  young  maidens  have  cast  themselves 


on  the  ground  almost  before  De  Soto,  one  of  them  bend- 
ing with  the  grace  and  gentleness  of  a  Madonna,  the 
other  clinging  to  her  sister  like  a  starded  fawn.  Behind 
them  stand  three  Indian  chiefs  ;  one  a  middle-aged  man, 
erect,  full  of  fire  and  bearing,  gazing  upon  a  new  rival 
invading  his  empire :  next  to  him,  an  old  casique,  or 
chief,  bearing  the  pipe  of  peace  richly  ornamented  with 
the  brightest  feathers,  bending  before  the  conqueror ; 
and  near  him,  a  young  chief,  with  a  panther  skin  thrown 
gracefully  around  his  loins,  the  ideal  of  the  Uncas  of 
Cooper.  He  has  thrown  his  bows  and  arrows  to  the 
ground  in  token  of  outward  submission,  but  he  draws 
up  his  form  with  haughty  pride  into  the  dignity  and 
implacable  sternness  of  an  Indian  Apollo. 

Nearest  to  De  Soto  is  the  confessor,  a  venerable  man 
with  flowing  beard,  who  has  also  caught  a  glimpse  of 
the  great  river,  and  meekly  and  reverendy,  as  he  sits 
on  his  mule,  lifts  his  eyes  and  clasps  his  hands  in  ad- 
miration and  gratitude  towards  heaven. 

At  his  side,  upon  a  rampant  gray  horse,  rides  a 
young  cavalier,  a  type  of  the  chivalry  of  Spain,  followed 
by  a  hurrying,  enthusiastic  group  of  standard-bearers, 
and  helmeted  men.  On  the  farther  background,  above 
them,  through  the  shades  of  a  grove  of  the  southern  live- 
oak,  stretches  away  a  forest  of  shining  lances. 

As  far  as  the  eye  can  reach,  rolls  the  glorious  Missis- 
sippi, its  waters  broken  by  glancing  canoes,  magical 
islands,  and  purple  shores.  The  discovery  itself  was 
made  just  after  they  reached  an  Indian  village  of  the 
Chickasaw  Bluffs,  where  we  see  every  emblem  of  savage 
life. 

This  painting  is  the  most  comprehensive  work  of  art 
ever  executed  by  an  American.  It  is  broader  in  the 
field  it  covers,  and  is  more  complete  and  universal  in 
its  emblems  of  life,  both  civilized  and  savage  ;  it  is  more 
exact  and  graphic  in  every  detail.  As  a  historical  pic- 
ture, there  is  nothing  belonging  to  the  time  or  the  sub- 
ject that  is  not  embraced,  nor  anything  embraced  which 
is  not  appropriate. 


BURIAL  OF  DE  SOTO  IN  THE  MISSISSIPPI.  9 

savages,  a  malignant  fever  finally  prostrated  him.  In  his  last  hours  he  called 
his  most  faithful  companions  around  him,  and  naming  his  successor,  he  laid 
down  to  die.  The  first  requiem  that  had  ever  been  heard  in  that  mysterious 
wilderness  was  lowly  chanced  on  the  banks  of  the  river ;  his  mantle  was 
wrapped  around  him :  and  in  this  winding-sheet,  at  midnight,  his  body  was 
taken  to  the  middle  of  the  stream,  and  sunk  to  the  bottom. 

During  their  long  and  gloomy  wandering,  which  was  one  continued  bat- 
tle, they  had  either  killed  or  loaded  with  chains,  all  their  prisoners.  After  vain 
and  protracted  attempts,  and  long  and  exhausting  wanderings,  no  other  hope 
of  escaping  from  the  dreadful  wilderness  around  them  was  left,  but  to  build 
barges,  with  which  to  float  down  the  Mississippi.  In  their  construction,  iron 
was  suddenly  discovered  to  be — what  nature  intended  it — of  more  value  than 
gold.  They  were  obliged  to  strike  off  the  fetters  from  their  captives,  to  make 
bolts  and  nails  to  hold  their  rude  floats  together.  And  so,  after  cheerless 
and  desperate  labors,  the  remains  of  the  wreck  of  the  chivalry  of  Spain  were 
launched  upon  that  silent  river,  and  the  solitudes  of  the  red  man's  home 
were  never  again  disturbed  by  the  Spaniards,  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi. 

France. — But  the  part  which  France  was  to  play  in  the  drama  of  North 
America,  was  far  more  brilliant  and  important.  Never  successful,  like  Phoe- 
nicia, Greece,  Rome  and  England,  in  founding  permanent  and  prosperous 
colonies,  she  however  participated  in  the  new  spirit  of  discovery;  and  during 
the  reign  of  Francis  I.,  the  energies  of  the  French  nation  were  called  into 
activity,  through  the  adventures  of  her  hardy  mariners  of  the  coast  of  Brittany, 
and  the  ambition  of  the  monarch  who  undertook,  and  for  many  years  carried 
on  a  struggle  with  Charles  V.,  the  greatest  of  the  crowned  princes  of 
Europe. 

No  sooner  had  the  discovery  of  the  fisheries  of  Newfoundland  become 
known,  than  the  sailors  of  Normandy  and  Brittany  followed  in  the  track  of  the 
Cabots.  As  early  as  1504,  they  had  begun  to  frequent  those  waters,  and  so 
diligently  were  the  fisheries  prosecuted,  we  learn  from  a  letter  written  August, 
1527,  to  Henry  VIII.  from  St.  John,  Newfoundland,  by  an  English  captain, 
that  he  found  in  one  harbor,  eleven  Norman,  and  one  Breton  sail  engaged 
in  the  business.  Their  familiarity  with  those  regions  was  to  seriously  affect 
the  future  history  of  the  United  States.  In  memory  of  their  own  country 
they  gave  to  the  island  of  Cape  Breton,  the  name  which  it  still  bears.  But 
commercial  motives  alone  influenced  these  expeditions,  and  all  the  plans  of 
colonization  in  the  New  World,  which  were  then  pressed  upon  the  court  of 
France,  proved  unavailing. 

John  Verazzani,  December,  1523.— Although  the  idea  of  searching  for  a 
north-west  passage,  to  reach  ■  Far  Cathay '  had  never  so  deeply  inflamed  the 
imagination  of  Frenchmen,  as  it  had  their  hotter-blooded  neighbors  beyond 
the  Pyrenees,  still,  the  French  King  favored  an  expedition  of  considerable 
magnitude.  Again,  a  son  of  Italy  was  to  light  civilization  on  its  way  to  the 
west ;  for,  although  the  splendor  of  the  Italian  Republics  had  begun  to  decline, 


io      VERAZZANTS  DISCOVERIES  ON  THE  AMERICAN  COAST. 

still,  to  their  brave  and  gifted  children,  the  structure  of  civilized  life  in  North 
America  was  to  be  forever  indebted. 

Four  ships  were  fitted  out,  and  John  Verazzani,  the  nobly  descended  and 
distinguished  Florentine  navigator,  commanded  the  fleet.  For  a  month  he 
took  a  south-westerly  course,  touching  at  the  Island  of  Madeira,  from  whence 
he  steered  due  west.  One  of  the  wild  tempests  of  the  Atlantic  scattered  the 
fleet  j  but  its  intrepid  commander,  in  his  single  caravel,  the  Dauphin,  went 
on  his  course. 

Cape  Fear  River ;  March,  1524. — His  courage,  and  endurance  were  at  last 
rewarded  by  the  sight  of  the  coast  of  North  Carolina,  where  the  brave  little 
sea-wanderer  folded  her  wings  in  the  mouth  of  Cape  Fear  River.  Seeking 
in  vain  for  a  good  harbor  to  the  southward,  and  finding  little  to  attract  him  on 
the  low,  sandy  reaches  of  the  Carolinas,  he  turned  to  the  north. 

His  record — the  oldest  still  preserved  of  North  American  explorations — will 
forever  leave  upon  the  fancy  of  the  historian,  strange  and  beautiful  images. 
He  tells  us  that  the  mild  natives,  whose  russet  complexions  made  them  look 
like  Saracens,  welcomed  them  with  hospitality ;  and  well  they  might,  since 
they  had  not  yet  been  taught  to  dread  these  wondrous  pale-faced  adventurers. 
They  were  dressed  in  skins,  and  ornamented  with  garlands  of  wild-bird  feath- 
ers of  brilliant  plumage.  But  this  first  embrace  of  Christians  and  untaught 
natives,  was  to  be  polluted  with  crime,  and  a  lesson  of  inhumanity  learned 
which  was  not  forgotten.  Somewhere  along  the  coast,  while  they  were  revel- 
ling in  the  red  man's  genial  hospitalities,  a  young  sailor  who  had  fallen  over- 
board, was  rescued,  in  a  drowning  state,  and  by  their  kind  attentions  restored 
to  life.  This  generous  act  was  repaid  by  a  deed  more  than  barbarous.  The 
companions  of  the  resuscitated  boy  tore  away  a  little  child  from  the  arms  of 
its  mother,  and  would  have  kidnapped  with  it,  a  young  maiden,  but  for  the 
fleetness  of  foot  which  bore  her  in  terror  into  the  forest.  And  yet,  heaven 
spared  the  vessel  which  carried  away  that  Indian  baby  ! 

New  York. — The  caravel  had  left  the  low  coasts  of  the  south  behind  her, 
and  came  in  sight  of  the  beetling  cliff  of  Neversink — that  first  sentinel  which 
stands  midway  between  the  enervating  blandishments  of  a  southern  clime,  and 
the  inspiring  vigor  of  the  great  free  North,  where  the  ocean  had  for  ages  been 
beating  in  vain  against  the  sea-gnawed  barriers.  Under  the  out-watching 
stars  of  our  far-off  sky,  the  Dauphin  rounded  the  headland,  passed  up  the 
Narrows,  and  glided  into  the  smooth  Bay  of  New  York.  Its  shores  and  islands 
were  clothed  with  majestic  forests  haunted  by  unscared  game,  and  vocal  with 
the  bird-songs  of  an  early  summer  morning. 

Could  but  some  rising  young  statesman  of  France,  then  absorbed  by  the 
solicitudes  of  contending  Empires  whose  fates  were  hanging  upon  the 
struggle  between  his  sovereign  and  the  mighty  ruler  of  Spain,  have  stood  on 
the  deck  of  Verazzani's  little  caravel,  then  slowly  coming  up  the  Bay  of  New 
York,  how  differently  might  the  history  of  these  strange  times  afterwards  have 
read  1     But  the  fleur  de  lis  was  never  to  be  planted  on  the  shores  of  the  Hud- 


THE  HARBORS  OF  NEWPORT  AND  BOSTON.  i% 

son,     Francis  had  staked  all  his  fortunes  upon  the  campaign  in  northern 
Italy,  and  the  brave  king  was  now  a  helpless  captive  in  the  castle  of  Pavia. 

Newport,  April,  1524. — After  a  few  days  of  wanderings  around  this  scene 
of  enchantment,  whose  beauty  is  unrivalled,  even  by  the  purple  Bay  of  Naples, 
Verazzani  once  more  put  to  sea.  Following  the  line  of  Long  Island,  passing 
Watch  Hill,  which  now  sends  its  light  flashing  far  off  on  the  Atlantic,  the 
hills  of  Newport  rose  on  his  view,  and  a  little  while  after,  the  Dauphin  was 
quietly  nestled  in  its  beautiful  haven. 

Boston. — After  a  few  days,  devoted,  as  all  his  time  was,  to  diligent  explora- 
tion, the  preparation  of  his  records,  and  the  tracing  of  outline  maps — all  of 
which  were  afterwards  to  prove  of  such  great  value — he  explored  the  harbor 
of  Boston,  and  its  neighborhood,  and  sailed  along  the  coast  of  New  England 
to  Nova  Scotia. ■ 

Verazzani  Disappears. — Although  this  voyage  of  Verazzani  excited  little  of 
the  interest  that  had  attended  the  expeditions  of  Columbus  and  the  Cabots, 
its  ultimate  results  were  of  the  greatest  moment.  His  narrative  of  the  entire 
voyage  is  the  earliest  original  account,  now  in  existence,  of  the  coast  of  the 
United  States  from  the  Carolinas  to  north-eastern  New  England.  Its  records 
are  clear  and  specific ;  his  statements  are  confirmed  by  those  who  came  after 
frim  ;  all  his  movements  were  directed  with  judgment;  his  writings  indicate  the 
keenest  powers  of  observation,  and  in  one  quarter,  at  least,  they  were  under- 
stood— the  Admiralty  of  France. 

Many  a  regret  has  been  felt  by  the  writers  on  that  wonderful  period,  that  no 
authentic  record  is  left  of  his  subsequent  life  or  fate.  It  is  certain  that  in  the 
month  of  July,  of  this  same  year,  he  returned  safely  to  France,  and  delivered 
to  the  government  his  cosmographic  Report.  He  had  given  the  name  New 
France  to  the  vast  regions  whose  shores  he  had  explored ;  and  he  furnished 
his  sdvereign  at  least  a  plausible  claim  to  the  broad  territory  which  was  after- 
wards to  give  an  occasion  for  the  collision  which  lasted  so  long  on  this  conti- 
nent, between  the  contending  powers  of  France  and  England. 

Here  he  disappears  from  authentic  history.  His  captured  king  and  im- 
poverished government  could  fit  him  out  no  new  expedition.  Some  narrators 
speak  of  his  violent  death  at  the  hands  of  Indians  and  Spaniards ;  while  Hak- 
luyt  asserts  that  he  made  three  subsequent  voyages  to  the  coast  of  America, 
and  sent  back  to  Henry  VIII.,  King  of  England,  a  map  of  his  sailings.  But 
the  statement  has  not  been  sustained ;  the  map  has  never  been  discovered ; 
and,  like  his  great  contemporary,  Sebastian  C?bot,  no  man  knows  his  sepulchre. 

James  Cartier,  1534. — At  this  time,  as  at  so  many  other  periods,  the  great 

1  His  letters  give  a  curious  description  of  the  sav-  countries  which  Verazzani  visited  while  seeking  for  a 

ages  he  met  with,  and  the  plants,  birds  and  animals  of  passage  to  the  East  Indies  by  the  north,  which  was  the 

these  unknown  regions.     His  discoveries  were  consid-  great  object  of  his  voyage,  as  it  was  of  almost  all  the 

ered  highly  important  at  the  time,  as  he  visited  more  enterprises  of  the  day.     An  account  of  his  voyage, 

than  seven  hundred  leagues  of  coast,  running  from  300  which  was  originally  sent  by  him  to  the  King  of  France, 

north  latitude  as  far  as  Newfoundland.     *     *  may  be  found  in  the  Collection  of  Ramusio. —  Lester*! 

In  the  Library  of  Palazzo  Strozzi  at  Florence,  is  pre-  Life  and  Voyages  of  Americus  Vespucius. 
served  a  cosmographical  description  of  the  coasts  and 


12  JAMES  CAR  TIER'S  EXPEDITION  FROM  FRANCE. 

governments  of  Europe  were  fortunate  in  their  chief  Ministers  of  State.  It  is 
the  era  from  which  we  date  the  appearance  of  a  long  line  of  statesmen  whose 
genius  illuminated  the  counsels  of  those  contending  empires. 

Chabot,  the  Admiral  of  France,  a  brave  and  sagacious  man,  absorbed  less  in 
the  rivalries  of  kings,  than  in  the  extension  of  French  commerce  over  distant 
seas,  had  entered  warmly  into  the  adventures  of  the  first  American  explorers, 
and  had  desired  in  vain  to  favor  another  expedition  by  Verazzani.  But  the 
times  had  now  grown  more  auspicious,  and  his  counsel  prevailed.  He  organ- 
ized a  new  and  more  important,  if  not  so  formidable  an  expedition,  which  was 
destined  to  end  in  greater  results  than  any  which  had  preceded  it.  Familiar 
with  all  nautical  interests,  and  brought  into  constant  intercourse  with  the 
.fishermen  of  the  north  of  France,  he  chose  a  daring  and  intelligent  marinei 
of  St.  Malo  to  lead  the  expedition. 

Cartier  Sails,  Summer,  1534. — On  the  20th  of  April,  that  superb  seaman, 
James  Cartier,  left  his  native  harbor  of  St.  Malo  with  two  ships.  There  is 
something  startling  in  the  record  history  gives,  for  it  seems  like  speaking  of 
one  of  our  modern  steam  trips.  In  twenty  days  he  saw  the  coasts  of  New- 
foundland. He  circumnavigated  the  island,  exploring  all  its  coasts:  and 
passed  through  the  Straits  of  Belle  Isle  into  the  gulf  beyond,  till  he  reached 
the  inlet  of  Gaspe.  On  a  bold  point  of  land  at  the  entrance  of  the  haven,  he 
planted  a  lofty  cross,  to  which  he  affixed  a  broad  shield  bearing  the  Lilies  of 
France,  and  an  inscription,  '  that  the  world  might  know  she  was  the  mistres 
of  that  country.' 

August,  1534. — Restless  in  his  ambition,  and  guided  by  keen  intelligence, 
he  pushed  his  way  westward  into  the  broad  entrance  of  the  great  river  of 
Canada,  whose  shores  gradually  approached  him  as  he  passed  up  the  magnifi- 
cent bay  he  was  afterwards  to  revisit.  But  the  autumnal  chill  was  already  in 
the  air ;  and  being  unprepared  for  the  severe  winter  which  he  knew  was  ap- 
proaching, he  lifted  his  anchors  again  for  Europe.  In  thirty  days  his  two 
chips  were  once  more  safely  moored  in  the  harbor  of  St.  Malo. 

His  well-authenticated  reports  of  discoveries  so  extensive  and  important, 
with  the  rapidity  of  his  voyages,  and  the  results  that  were  expected  to  follow 
chem,  spread  joy  through  the  court  and  capital  of  the  French  monarch,  and 
Admiral  Chabot  found  no  difficulty  in  equipping  a  fresh  and  more  imposing 
expedition.  That  gallant  nation  was  still  contending  with  the  united  powers  of 
Austria  and  Spain  j  but  the  new  commission  had  no  sooner  been  issued  than 
it  was  joined  by  young  members  of  the  nobility,  and  the  completest  prepa- 
rations for  the  departure  were  made.  Before  the  expedition  sailed,  the 
whole  company  went  in  solemn  procession  to  the  Cathedral,  to  receive  ab- 
solution at  the  altar,  with  the  benediction  of  the  Bishop. 

May  19,  1535. — Thus,  on  the  19th  of  May,  less  than  eight  months  from 
the  time  of  Cartier' s  return,  he  once  more  sailed  out  of  the  harbor  of  St 
Malo  for  the  New  France  beyond  the  Atlantic.     It  was  the   most  wisely 


C ARTIER  ASCENDS   THE  ST.   LAWRENCE.  13 

designed,  and  intelligently  guided,  as  well  as  one  of  the  most  brilliant  expe- 
ditions that  had  left  the  shores  of  the  Old  World. 

Less  fortunate  than  on  his  first  voyage,  it  was  not  till  the  10th  of  August 
that  he  caught  sight  again  of  Newfoundland.  Passing  out  from  the  Straits  of 
Belle  Isle  into  the  Gulf  on  the  day  of  St.  Lawrence,  he  gave  to  the  broad 
waters  the  name  of  the  venerated  martyr.  Sailing  up  the  majestic  river,  he 
moored  his  ships  in  a  tranquil  harbor  of  the  Isle  of  Orleans,  where  he  met  from 
the  Algonquin-Hurons  the  same  welcome  which  the  sons  of  the  forest  in  every 
instance  extended  to  Europeans,  until  bitter  experience  taught  them  to  dread 
the  terrible  requital  of  injustice  from  those  they  had  fondly  believed  to  be 
the  children  of  the  Great  Spirit.  Leaving  their  ships  in  safe  moorings,  they 
passed  up  the  river  in  a  pinnace  and  open  boats  to  the  capital  of  the  Huron 
king  on  Hochelaga  Island,  where  the  city  of  Montreal  now  stands.  Ascend- 
ing the  lofty  hill  which  rose  behind  the  Indian  town,  Carrier's  eye  rested  on 
a  scene  of  unutterable  grandeur.  Through  a  vast  plain  covered  with  primeval 
forests,  except  where  luxuriant  fields  were  waving  with  Indian  corn,  was 
rolling  a  more  majestic  river  than  Europe  sent  to  the  sea.  Overlooking  the 
tiny  clusters  of  huts  at  his  feet,  the  quick  kindling  fancy  of  Cartier  pictured 
a  vast  capital  growing  up  in  the  centre  of  a  future  empire,  and  he  named 
the  height  where  he  stood  Mount-Real,  '  and  time  which  has  transferred  the 
name  to  the  island  is  realizing  his  vision.' ' 

Presents  were  exchanged,  hospitalities  were  reciprocated,  and  friendly 
relations  were  established  with  the  King,  and  his  warrior  tribe,  who  joyfully 
believed  that  heaven  itself  had  sent  them  a  superior  and  friendly  race  of  beings. 
But  the  blasts  of  an  Arctic  winter  were  beginning  to  pour  down  from  the 
frozen  North,  and  parting  from  his  new  friends  with  a  promise  to  return,  the 
Frenchmen  descended  the  icy  river  to  find  shelter  in  their  ships  at  Quebec. 

Of  the  rigor  of  the  season  they  had  formed  but  a  faint  conception.  Its 
desolations  were  made  more  frightful  by  the  breaking  out  of  the  scurvy,  till 
then  an  unknown  disease,  which  carried  off  twenty-five  of  the  seamen.  At 
last  when  spring  had  unlocked  the  mighty  stream,  they  made  preparations 
for  their  return  voyage.  A  huge  cross  was  erected  on  the  shore,  holding  a 
massive  shield  bearing  the  arms  of  France,  and  a  proclamation  of  her 
sovereignty  over  the  improvised  wilderness-empire.  The  last  friendly 
visit  of  its  native  monarch  was  being  paid,  when  the  flag-vessel  lifted  her 
anchor,  and  floated  down  the  bosom  of  the  broad  river,  bearing  away  the 
betrayed  captive  king  of  the  Hurons  a  prisoner  from  his  native  land  ! 
Cartier  had  told  the  Hurons  that  he  would  return ;  and  he  consoled  their 
chief  with  the  promise,  that  after  seeing  the  gorgeous  land  of  the  pale-face^ 
he  should  be  brought  safely  back  to  his  forest  home  ;  and  the  Frenchman 
meant  to  keep  his  word.  But  the  caged  eagle  pined  amidst  the  splendors  of 
his  royal  brother's  palace  at  Paris,  and  long  before  Cartier  was  ready  for  his 
return  voyage,  the  Huron  king  had  died  of  a  broken  heart ! 

Cartier  had  carried  with  him,  like  all  the  early  ocean  adventurers,  visions 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  L  p.  ax. 


14  FRANCIS  DE  LA  ROQUE'S  EXPEDITION. 

of  gems  and  gold.  Except  in  a  decimated  and  discouraged  crew,  the 
skins  of  wild  beasts,  the  plumage  of  wild  birds,  and  shattered  vessels,  he  had 
but  one  poor  trophy  to  show  as  a  reward  for  all  his  dangers  and  daring — 
a  betrayed  and  captive  sovereign  stolen  from  his  wild  regal  home,  pining  to 
see  once  more  the  smoke  of  his  own  wigwam  curling  over  his  native  forest, 
and  to  look  again  on  the  dusky  faces  of  his  beloved  people  ! — Poor  Cartier  ! 
Poor  France  !  Poor  civilization.  Oh  !  Cross  of  the  dying  Nazarene,  how 
many  crimes  are  perpetrated  under  thy  holy  shadow  ! 

Three  or  four  years  now  passed  before  a  fresh  expedition  was  undertaken. 
Another  short  peace  between  Charles  and  Francis  had  ended  their  third  des- 
perate struggle ;  and  while  France  was  taking  one  more  free  breath,  the  pride 
of  the  court  was  wounded  at  the  shameful  surrender  of  all  the  fruit  of  her 
American  discoveries.  Carrier's  reports  were  fully  known ;  and  the  image  of 
that  mighty  river  sweeping  through  so  vast  a  garden  domain,  flashed  vividly 
on  the  imaginations  of  the  ambitious  and  the  daring,  and  roused  the  spirit  of 
the  indifferent. 

Lord  of  Roberval,  Jan.,  1540. — Francis  de  la  Roque,  Lord  of  Roberval, 
proposed  to  lead  a  new  expedition ;  and  his  vanity  was  gratified  by  being 
made  viceroy  over  the  broad  territories  lying  along  the  river  St.  Lawrence. 
The  king,  however,  placed  his  chief  reliance  on  Cartier,  whom  he  commis- 
sioned as  captain-general  and  chief  pilot  of  the  expedition.  As  a  perma- 
nent colony  was  contemplated,  he  was  authorized  to  take  his  choice,  among 
all  the  prisons  of  France,  of  such  artisans  and  laborers  as  he  might  require, 
since  well-to-do  workmen  were  not  easily  persuaded  to  leave  their  homes.  ■  It 
was  with  such  material  the  captain-general  was  to  establish  his  colony.  The 
division  of  honors  and  prerogatives  early  ending  in  rivalry  and  separation,  the 
chief  object  of  the  expedition  was,  of  course,  defeated. 

May  23,  1541. — Cartier  was,  however,  too  resolute  and  ambitious  to 
abandon  his  design  ;  and  the  following  spring,  without  waiting  for  his  tardy 
viceroy,  he  sailed  from  St.  Malo  with  five  ships.  A  prosperous  passage 
brought  him  to  the  .scene  of  his  former  adventures.  The  outraged  Hurons, 
finding  that  the  white  men  had  returned  without  bringing  back  their  king,  at 
once  made  demonstrations  of  hostility.  The  French  built  a  fort  for  security  on 
the  Island  of  Orleans,  a  short  distance  below  Quebec.  But  they  were  foiled  in 
every  attempt  to  establish  themselves  on  shore ;  and  finding  that  no  atone- 
ment could  be  made  for  their  cruel  treachery,  they  dragged  out  a  winter  in 
sullen  gloom  ;  and  stealing  away  with  the  returning  summer,  left  the  great 
river  behind  them,  glad  to  arrive  safely  at  the  harbor  from  which  they  had 
sailed. 

The  Lord  of   Roberval  reached  the  seat  of  his  viceroyalty  soon  after 
Cartier  had  left.     Encountering  the  same  hostility  from  the  Hurons,  and 

1  As  was  to  be  expected,  the  seamen  who  took  part  sins,  to  whom  piracy  furnished  the  only  congenial  occu- 

in  such    expeditions  consisted  of   the  most  reckless  pation.— St.   John's    Life  of  Sir    Walter  Raleigh, 

frequenters  of  the  ocean,  who  fled  to  its  wave  from  the  vol.  L  p.  29.     London  :  Chapman  &  Hall,  1868. 
jailor  and  the  hangman, — blasphemers,  ruffians,  assas- 


THE  PR  O  TEST  ANT  REFORM  A  TION.  1 5 

powerless  to  accomplish  any  useful  purpose,  he,  too,  wore  away  a  winter  of 
disappointment  and  distress  ;  and  when  the  St.  Lawrence  opened,  he  returned 
to  France.  But  he  was  still  haunted  by  visions  of  wealth  and  power ;  and 
six  years  later  he  fitted  out  another  expedition,  and  sailed  for  the  St.  Lawrence, 
He  was  never  heard  of  again.  This  ended  all  further  attempts  at  exploring 
or  colonization  in  the  New  World,  on  the  part  of  the  French  Government,  for 
the  next  fifty  years. 

The  Protestant  Reformation. — The  mightiest  movement  in  the  thought  of 
mankind  since  the  rise  of  Christianity  over  the  ruins  of  Paganism,  had  now 
started  in  Europe.  Beginning  with  the  assertion  of  its  cardinal  principle — 
the  right  of  individual  conscience  to  determine  its  religious  responsibility — it 
soon  scaled  the  narrow  precincts  of  private  judgment  in  religion,  and  spread 
over  the  whole  field  of  civil  affairs.  Although  it  was  the  desire  of  Luther 
and  other  great  reformers,  to  confine  the  movement  within  ecclesiastical  limits, 
yet  it  early  became  evident  that  it  would  soon  transcend  all  such  boundaries, 
and  open  an  era  of  political  revolution.  The  genius  of  Calvin  had  electrified 
the  mind  of  France,  and  the  next  half  century  was  to  witness  one  of  the 
most  sanguinary  and  protracted  civil  conflicts  that  has  ever  torn  society. 
All  Europe  was  convulsed  by  new  ideas  ;  but  nowhere  was  the  collision  so 
fierce  as  in  France,  where  it  involved  the  last  struggle  of  feudalism  with  the 
central  power  of  the  monarch ;  and  the  first  grapple  of  young  Calvinism, 
which  had  come  up  in  its  might,  with  the  colossal  power  of  the  ancient 
religion. 

The  Huguenots  in  Florida,  Feb.  28,  1562. — Although  the  government  of 
France  gave  no  attention  to  American  enterprises  during  this  period  of  fierce 
domestic  convulsions,  the  Huguenots — as  the  French  Protestants  were  called — 
were  casting  about  for  some  fate  better  than  extinction  by  slaughter,  which 
seemed  to  await  them  at  home.  They  had  a  friend  in  Jasper  Coligny,  the 
great  Admiral  of  France,  a  man  illuminated  beyond  almost  all  others  of  his 
age,  with  a  soul  too  great  to  favor  persecution.  Under  the  reign  of  the  feeble 
Charles  IX.,  he  was  allowed  to  lend  encouragement  to  the  plan  of  founding  a 
Huguenot  colony  in  Florida ;  and  having  obtained  a  commission  from  the  king, 
a  squadron  was  fitted  out,  under  the  command  of  John  Ribault,  who  sailed  for 
America  on  the  28th  of  February,  1562. 

Ribault  was  a  brave  man,  and  an  experienced  navigator.  Being  withal  a 
firm  Protestant,  and  known  to  enjoy  the  unlimited  confidence  of  Coligny,  he 
soon  gathered  around  him  some  of  the  bravest  and  the  best  of  the  young  no- 
bility of  France,  besides  being  furnished  with  veteran  troops. 

Coligny  could  restrain  neither  his  gratitude  nor  delight,  when  the  new 
expedition  got  under  way.  He  saw  the  realization  of  one  of  his  long 
cherished  hopes  in  the  establishment  of  a  refuge  for  his  Huguenot  brethren  \ 
while,  as  a  statesman,  he  dreamed  that  one  such  settlement  in  a  free  country, 
might  form  the  nucleus  of  a  great  Protestant  French  Empire. 

The  Landing  in  Florida,  May,  1562. — Florida  was  already  known  as  the 


16  COLIGNTS  HUGUENOT  COLONY  IN  FLORIDA. 

most  delightful  land  yet  discovered  in  the  West,  being  blessed  with  the  -limat* 
of  Italy,  and  the  fertility  of  a  virgin  soil.  After  touching  at  St.  Augustine,  the 
little  Huguenot  fleet  sailed  northward,  where  they  passed  the  beautiful  St. 
Johns,  which  they  named  the  river  of  May.  Still  further  up  the  coast,  they 
were  so  charmed  with  Port  Royal,  that  they  determined  to  make  it  their  home ; 
and  landing,  they  built  a  fort,  which  they  called  Carolina,  in  honor  of  the 
French  king — a  name  which,  although  the  colony  perished,  was  still  preserved 
by  the  English,  who  occupied  it  a  century  afterwards. 

Here  the  exiles  found  themselves  surrounded  with  everything  that  could 
charm  in  nature.  Broad-spreading  oaks,  bearing  the  honors  of  centuries,  were 
interspersed  with  lofty  pines ;  wild  fowl  brooded  among  their  branches,  and 
skimmed  the  surface  of  all  the  surrounding  waters ;  field  and  grove  were  filled 
with  wild  flowers  that  loaded  the  air  with  fragrance ;  a  soft  atmosphere  rose 
into  serene  heavens ;  while  wild  grapes  and  other  fruits,  growing  in  profusion 
in  all  the  woods,  almost  reconciled  them  to  their  new  home,  and  softened  the 
bitterness  of  longings  for  their  native  land. 

Leaving  a  little  colony  of  twenty-six,  as  the  nucleus  of  a  permanent  estab- 
lishment, Ribault  returned  for  reinforcements.  But  in  the  disturbed  condition 
of  France,  the  promised  reinforcements  could  not  be  sent.  Dissensions  grew 
up  among  the  colonists,  and  the  arbitrary  cruelty  of  the  commandant  raised  a 
mutiny,  which  cost  him  his  life.  The  love  of  home,  so  irrepressible  in  the 
French  heart,  made  them  discontented ;  and  although  their  treatment  of  the 
Indians  had  secured  them  kindness  and  hospitality,  yet  they  determined  once 
more  to  revisit  their  native  country.  After  long  labor,  they  constructed  a  rude 
brigantine,  and  made  ready  for  the  voyage.  But  in  the  joy  of  embarkation 
they  neglected  to  lay  in  a  sufficient  store  of  provisions,  and  in  this  frail  bark 
they  put  to  sea.  Death  by  tempest  or  famine  seemed  to  await  them  ;  but  in 
their  extremity  they  were  picked  up  by  a  British  vessel,  and  carried  to  England. 
And  this  was  the  end  of  the  first  attempt  to  escape  from  the  persecutions  of 
Europe,  and  establish  a  colony  on  the  inhospitable  shores  of  a  distant  land. 

July,  1564. — But  neither  the  zeal  nor  the  courage  of  Coligny  gave  way. 
He  sent  out  another  expedition,  under  the  command  of  Laudonnier,  who 
had  accompanied  the  first  under  Ribault.  The  dream  of  gold,  with  the  fas- 
cinating accounts  of  the  climate  of  Florida  which  was  said  greatly  to  prolong 
human  life,  soon  brought  a  large  party  together ;  and  in  July  their  three 
vessels  landed  in  the  River  May,  on  whose  banks  they  built  a  fort,  also 
named  Carolina.  But  the  company  was  made  up  chiefly  of  dissolute  and 
worthless  characters,  whose  indolence  and  vices  soon  reduced  them  to  the 
verge  of  famine.  Order  could  no  longer  be  preserved.  Laudonnier  was  com- 
pelled  to  relinquish  to  the  insurgents  a  vessel  in  which  they  embarked, 
under  the  pretext  of  returning  to  France ;  but  really  for  carrying  out  a  scheme 
of  piracy  against  the  Spaniards  on  the  coast.  They  soon,  however,  met 
with  the  fate  they  had  deserved  so  well  for  inaugurating  the  crime  of  murder 
and  theft  upon  the  ocean  for  the  first  time,  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.     The 


COLIGNY  SENDS  A  SECOND   EXPEDITION.  O 

Spaniards  overhauled  their  vessel,  and  making  prisoners  of  most  of  the  crew, 
sold  them  as  slaves.  A  few  of  the  more  desperate  made  their  escape  in  an 
open  boat,  and  being  compelled,  by  starvation,  to  return  to  Fort  Carolina,  the 
French  commander  promptly  condemned  the  ringleaders  to  death. 

Sir  John  Hawkins,  August  3,  1565. — Want  was  now  pressing  upon  the 
little  colony,  reduced  in  numbers,  and  disheartened  in  spirit ;  and  they  resorted 
to  the  desperate  determination  of  returning  to  France,  choosing  to  encounter 
the  perils  of  the  ocean  in  such  craft  as  they  could  tit  out,  rather  than  remain. 
Preparations  had  been  completed  for  their  departure,  when  Sir  John 
Hawkins,  the  great  kidnapper,  who  was  returning  from  the  West  Indies, 
where  he  had  sold  a  cargo  of  native  Africans,  whom  he  had  stolen  from  their 
homes,  dropped  into  the  harbor.  That  wild  and  cruel,  but  sometimes 
magnanimous  marauder  of  the  sea,  relieved  the  famishing  colonists  with  abun- 
dant supplies  of  provisions,  besides  giving  them  one  of  the  vessels  of  his  fleet. 
Iking  now  more  anxious  than  ever  to  depart,  and  when  on  the  point  of  sailing, 
Ribault,  with  a  new  expedition,  entered  the  river.  He  brought  with  him  full  sup- 
plies, a  fresh  company  of  emigrants  with  their  families,  seeds  for  planting,  with 
the  best  implements  of  agriculture,  and  a  collection  of  domestic  animals.  In 
a  sudden  transition  of  feeling,  the  little  colony  greeted  him  with  joy.  He  at 
once  assumed  supreme  authority,  and  every  thing  promised  well  for  the 
permanent  establishment  of  a  Protestant  colony. 

Philip  IE,  1565. — But  this  fair  prospect  was  soon  to  be  clouded  :  they 
were  not  to  remain  long  undisturbed.  Philip  II.,  the  champion  of  th€ 
ancient  church,  and  the  ntost  bigoted  and  cruel  of  monarchs,  had  ascended 
the  throne  of  Spain,  which  was  the  most  powerful  monarchy  of  Europe.  When 
he  learned  that  a  colony  of  French  Protestants  had  dared  to  settle  in  what  he 
deemed  his  own  dominions,  and  send  out  pirates  to  prey  upon  the  commerce 
and  lives  of  his  subjects,  he  was  thrown  into  a  frenzy  of  uncontrollable  rage. 
Orders  were  given  for  the  extermination  of  the  intruders,  and  the  work  was 
committed  to  a  man  completely  qualified  for  the  mission. 

May  20,  1565. — Pedro  Melendez  de  Aniles  realizes  perfectly  the  ideal 
which  the  records  of  those  times  have  left  us,  of  a  race  of  men  that  has  finally 
disappeared  from  the  earth.  Burning  with  the  lust  for  gold,  and  darkened 
with  bigotry  and  superstition ;  fearless  of  death,  and  enamored  of  glory ;  loyal 
to  tyrants,  and  abject  to  priests  ;  restrained  by  no  sentiment  of  humanity ; 
devotees  of  a  religion  without  mercy,  and  a  vocabulary  without  the  name  of 
crime  ;  pursuing  Heresy  with  cutlass,  fire  and  rack  j  stealing  the  natives  of  any 
land,  and  establishing  slavery  wherever  they  planted  the  banner  of  the  King 
with  the  Cross  of  Jesus ;  polluting  the  fairest  of  all  the  continents  with  the 
poison  of  superstition,  and  leaving  for  the  future,  the  legacies  of  slavery  and 
oppression — such  were  the  men  to  whom  the  apparent  waywardness  of  a  cruel 
destiny  had  committed  the  fair  islands  of  the  West  Indies,  and  the  broad  lands 
of  the  adjacent  continent. 
2 


1 8    MELENDEZ  SENT  TO  EXTERMINATE   THE  HUGUENOTS. 

They  were  the  faithful  ministers  of  the  Court  of  Spain — richly  rewarded, 
and  fondly  cherished  instruments  of  her  merciless  Philip — and  worthy  repre- 
sentatives of  the  dark  and  bloody  bigotry  of  her  people.  If,  in  the  blaze  of 
a  new  civilization  breaking  out  from  the  heart  of  Europe,  the  Duke  of  Alva 
could  perpetrate  those  atrocities  in  the  Netherlands,  with  whose  dreadful 
record  Prescott  and  Motley  scare  us  even  in  our  day  dreams,  what  narrator  can 
be  found  for  the  bloody  deeds  of  Melendez,  in  the  far-off  wilds  of  America  hid 
beyond  the  Atlantic  ? 

A  long  career  of  adventures  filled  with  peril,  and  crimsoned  with  murder, 
but  overlaid  with  gold,  had  qualified  the  veteran  commander  for  the 
welcome  mission.  The  heir  to  all  his  wealth  had  been  shipwrecked  among 
the  Bermuda  Islands,  and  he  wanted  to  go  in  search  of  his  only  son.  He 
wished,  besides,  to  wipe  out  the  disgrace  of  a  long  arrest  and  final  conviction 
for  crimes  he  had  years  before  committed,  too  atrocious  for  the  pardon  of 
anybody  but  a  King  like  Philip.  But  all  this  mattered  not,  so  long  as  he  was 
the  fittest  instrument  the  King  could  find  for  his  purpose  ;  and  taking  him 
again  into  favor,  and  loading  him  with  honors  and  authority,  the  compact  was 
signed  with  his  sovereign. 

Melendez  engaged,  at  his  own  expense,  to  invade  Florida,  and  take  pos- 
session of  it  in  the  name  of  his  King ;  to  explore  all  its  rivers,  harbors  and 
coasts ;  to  take  with  him  five  hundred  soldiers,  as  an  invading  force ;  to  estab- 
lish slavery  on  the  soil  as  a  permanent  institution,  beginning  by  an  importation 
of  five  hundred  negroes ;  while  he  was  to  introduce  every  species  of  domestic 
animals,  make  the  sugar-cane  the  staple  of  the  country,  and  carry  with  him  at 
least  five  hundred  married  men,  with  their  families,  twelve  ecclesiastics,  and 
four  members  of  the  Company  of  Jesus.  The  cry  for  the  extermination  of 
Heretics  in  those  new  lands,  and  where — sadly  enough  for  them — some  of 
their  number  had  been  guilty  of  piracy,  waked  all  Spain  to  the  enthusiasm  of 
a  new  crusade,  darkened  by  the  spirit  of  fanaticism,  so  congenial  with  the 
spirit  of  the  time  and  the  nation.1    There  was  a  rush  from  all  quarters,  to  join 

1  Of  the  utter  destruction  of  Protestantism  in  Spain,  of  the  people  was  rebuked,  and  their  spirit  quenched 

and  the  consequences  to  that  unhappy  nation,  Prescott  under  the  malignant  influence  of  an  eye  that  never 

[J'/ii/i/  II.,  vol.  i.  p.  445]  says  :  slumbered, — of  an   unseen  arm,  ever  raised   to  strike. 

"The  fires  lighted  for  the  Protestants  continued  to  How  could  there  be  freedom  of  thought,  where  there 

burn  with  fury  in  all  parts  of  the  country.  At  length  they  was  no  freedom  of  utterance  ? — or  freedom  of  utterance 

gradually  slackened  and  died  away,  from   mere  want  where  it   was  as   dangerous   to  say  too  little,  as   too 

of  fuel  to  feed  them.     The  year  1570  may  be  regarded  much?     Freedom  cannot  go  along  with  fear.     Every 

as  the  period  of  the  last  Auto  da  Fe,  in  which  the  Lu-  way  the  mind  of  the  Spaniard  was  in  fetters, 

therans  played   a  conspicuous  part.     The  subsequent  "His   moral  sense  was  miserably  perverted.     Men 

celebrations  were  devoted  chiefly  to  relapsed  Jews  and  were  judged  not  by  their  practice,  but  by  their  profes- 

Mohammedans  ;    and   if   a    Protestant    Heretic  was  sions.     Creed  became  a  substitute  for  conduct.     Dif- 

sometimes  added  to  this  list,  it  was  'but  as  the  glean-  ference  of  faith  made  a  wider  gulf  of  separation  than 

ing  of  grapes  after  the  vintage  is  done.'     Never  was  difference  of  race,  language,  or  even  of  interest.    Spain 

there  a  persecution  which  did  its  work  more  thoroughly.  no  longer  formed  one  of  the  great  brotherhood  of  the 

1'he  blood  of  the  martyr  is  sometimes  said  to  be  the  Christian  nations  :  an  immeasurable  barrier  was  raised 

seed  of  the  church  ;  but  the  storm  of  persecution  fell  as  between  that   Kingdom  and   the  Protestant  States  of 

heavily  on  the  Spanish  Protestants  as  it  did  on  the  Al-  Europe.     The.early  condition  of  perpetual  warfare  with 

bigenses  in  the  thirteenth  century,  blighting  every  liv-  the  Arabs,  who  overran  the  country,  had  led  the  Span- 

ing  thing,  so  that  no  germ  remained  for  future  harvests.  iards   to  mingle  religion  strangely  with   their  politics. 

Spain   might   now   boast  that  the  stain  of  Heresy  no  The   effect   continued,    when    the   cause   had    ceased, 

longer  defiled  the  hem  of  her  garment.     But  at  what  a  Their  wars  with  the  European  nations  became  religious 

price  was  this  purchased  !     Not  merely  by  the  sacrifice  wars  :  in  fighting   England,  or  the  Netherlands,  they 

of  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  a  few  thousands  of  the  ex-  were  fighting  the  enemies  of  God.     It  was   the   same 

isiing  generation,  but  by  the  disastrous  consequences  everywhere.     In  their  contest  with  the  unoffending  na- 

untold  forever  on  the  country.     Folded  under  the  dark  tives  of  the   New  World,   they  were  still  batding  with 

wing  of  the  Inquisition,  Spain  was  shut  out  from  the  the  enemies  of  God.     Their  wars  took  the  character  of 

light,  which,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  broke  over  the  a  perpetual  crusade,  and  were  conducted  with  all  the 

rest  of  E  jrope,  stimulating  the  nations  to  greater  enter-  ferocity  which  fanaticism  could  inspire." 
prise,  in  every  denartment  of  knowledge.     The  genius 


ST.   AUGUSTINE  FOUNDED—THE  HUGUENOTS  PERISH.     19 

the  enterprise.  All  the  sailors  and  soldiers  the  commander  required ;  whole 
families,  of  all  classes — mechanics,  and  common  laborers,  Jesuits,  and  priests, 
— combined  to  make  up  the  expedition.  It  was  a  quick  passage ;  but  a  tem- 
pest scattered  the  fleet,  and  it  was  only  with  a  third  part  of  his  forces  that 
the  commander  reached  Porto  Rico. 

Melendez  had  determined  to  found  a  city  in  the  beginning,  and  construct 
strong  fortifications.  Without  waiting  for  the  rest  of  his  fleet,  he  sailed  for  the 
coast  of  Florida.  He  gained  the  first  sight  of  it  on  the  day  of  the  great,  and 
perhaps  most  venerated  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Christian  church  j  and  landing 
on  the  site  of  his  contemplated  city,  he  named  the  spot  St.  Augustine,  and 
commenced  his  work.  Philip  was  proclaimed  monarch  of  all  North  America ; 
and,  in  the  midst  of  imposing  religious  ceremonies,  the  foundations  of  the 
oldest  city  in  the  United  States  were  laid. 

Ribault,  who  was  informed  of  the  arrival  of  Melendez,  put  to  sea,  to  meet 
him  ;  but  an  autumn  gale  swept  his  fleet  in  an  utter  wreck  on  the  coast. 
Melendez  marched,  with  the  chief  part  of  his  garrison,  through  the  forests  and 
marshes  to  the  St.  Johns,  and  falling  upon  the  defenceless  colony,  doomed  iis 
people  to  promiscuous  massacre.  Neither  the  aged,  the  sick,  the  mother, 
nor  the  infant,  were  spared.  Laudonnier  and  a  few  of  his  companions  fled  to 
the  forest ;  but,  starvation  staring  them  in  the  face,  most  of  them  returned 
under  a  promise  of  clemency,  and  surrendered  themselves  to  the  enemy,  only 
to  be  instantly  murdered,  while  the  remaining  fragment  reached  the  seaside. 
The  carnage  had  already  been  sanctified  by  the  celebration  of  mass.,  A  cross 
was  raised  over  the  site  of  the  massacre,  and  for  a  Christian  church  the  very 
ground  was  dedicated  which  was  still  smoking  with  the  blood  of  the  little 
Huguenot  colony. 

A  proclamation  was  then  made  by  Melendez,  inviting  all  the  French, 
e.  obracing  the  sailors  of  the  shipwrecked  fleet  and  the  colonists  who  had  fled,  to 
come  back,  trusting  to  his  mercy  :  and  in  their  desperation  they  all  responded. 
They  numbered  nearly  one  thousand,  as  they  gathered  on  the  banks  of  the  river. 
But  no  faith  was  to  be  kept  with  a  Heretic.  With  their  hands  bound  behind 
them,  they  were  started  for  St.  Augustine.  As  the  sad  procession  was  reach- 
ing its  destination,  at  a  given  signal  of  drums  and  trumpets,  the  Spaniards  fell 
upon  their  victims,  and  put  them  to  death.  A  few  Catholics  were  saved, 
with  some  mechanics,  who  were  instantly  made  slaves ;  the  rest  were  all  mas- 
sacred, '  not  as  Frenchmen,'  says  the  Spanish  account,  '  but  as  Lutherans.' 

Thus  perished  the  Huguenot  colony,  and  with  it,  the  first  attempt  to  res- 
cue North  America  from  the  barbarism  of  the  Savage,  and  the  degradation  of 
i  bigoted  faith.1 

1  The  Huguenots  and   the   French  nation  did  not  in  which,  with  one  hundred  and  fifty  men,  he,  on  the 

ihare  the  indifference  of  the  court.     Dominic  de  Gourg-  twenty-second  of  August,  1567,  embarked  for  Florida 

nes — a   bold    soldier  of  Gascony,  whose  life  had  been  to  destroy  and  revenge.     He  surprised  two  forts  near 

a   series    of  adventures,  now   employed    in    the  army  the  mouth  of  the  St.  Matheo  ;  and,  as  terror  magnified 

against     Spain,    now    a   prisoner  and    a   galley-slave  the   number  of  his  followers,  the  consternation  of  the 

among  the  Spaniards,  taken    by  the   Turks   with    the  Spaniards  enabled  hiin  to  gain  possession  of  the  larger 

vessel    in    which    he  rowed,  and  redeemed  by  the  com-  establishment,  near  the  spot  which  the  French  colony 

mander  of  the  Knights  of  Malta — burned  with  a  desire  had  occupied,    'loo  weak  to  maintain  his  position,  he,  in 

to  avenge  his  own  wrongs  and  the  honor  of  his  country.  May,  1568,  hastily  weighed  anchor  for  Europe,  having 

1'he  sale  of  his  property,  and  the  contributions  of  his  first  hanged  his  prisoners,  upon   the  trees,  and   placed 

friends,  furnished  the  means  of  equipping  three  ships,  over   them   the   inscription  :    "  I  do  not  this   as   unw 


*o  ENGLAND'S   THRONE   UNDER  ELIZABETH. 

After  this  atrocious  victory,  Melendez  sent  an  expedition  north  to  Chesa- 
peake Bay,  with  the  design  of  establishing  another  colony,  and  taking  posses- 
sion  of  the  territory.  But  he  had  already  reached  the  limits  which  destiny 
had  assigned  to  the  progress  of  Spanish  dominion  in  that  direction.  He 
returned  to  Spain,  stripped  of  his  fortune,  but  greeted  with  the  honors  of  a 
triumph. 

The  fate  of  the  Florida  colony  excited  little  sympathy  at  the  Court  of 
Charles  IX.  Forty  years  were  still  to  pass  before  England  was  to  found  her 
first  permanent  colony  in  North  America  ;  and  Spain  was  left  in  quiet  posses- 
sion of  her  territories  in  the  New  World.  Cuba  was  the  centre  of  her  Ameri- 
can dominion,  which  extended  undisputed  over  the  tropical  archipelago,  and 
the  shores  of  the  neighboring  continent — including  Florida,  and  the  vast 
regions  to  the  north  and  west ;  Mexico,  Central  America,  and  the  Isthmus  be- 
tween the  two  oceans,  and  the  circumjacent  coasts;  while  the  vast  expanse  of 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico  was  embraced  by  her  encircling  empire.  Over  this  vast 
dominion  her  flag  was  to  remain  waving  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years. 


SECTION   SECOND. 

PERMANENT   SETTLEMENTS — THE    BEGINNING   OF   AMERICAN    COLONIZATION. 

Nearly  eighty  years  went  by  after  the  discovery  of  the  continent  of  North 
America  by  Cabot,  before  England  was  ready  to  undertake  its  colonization. 
For  carrying  out  such  a  work — one  that  was  to  have  so  much  to  do  with  the 
well-being  of  mankind,  and  the  development  of  modern  civilization, — the 
period  had  now  come.  A  sovereign  was  on  the  throne  of  England,  whose 
genius  and  ambition  were  to  mark  a  new  period  in  the  advancement  of  that 
country,  and  cover  her  reign  with  a  splendor  unequalled  by  any  woman  who 
had  swayed  a  sceptre  since  the  time  of  Zenobia.1  Around  her  throne  were 
gathered  some  of  the  greatest  men  of  modern  times.  Cecil  was  lending  to 
her  counsels  the  might  of  his  wisdom ;  Bacon,  the  interpreter  of  all  science, 
and  the  greatest  of  all  the  historians  of  learning,  was  doing  a  larger 
share  than  falls  to  the  lot  of  many  men,  to  add  splendor  to  an  age ;  while 
Shakespeare,  the  poet  of  all  time,  was  shedding  the  radiance  of  his  genius 
over  that  wonderful  period. 

Walter  Raleigh. — But  one  name  was  to  become  dearer  to  Americans  than 
all.  The  most  brilliant  of  courtiers,  and  among  the  most  gifted  of  men ; 
magnetic  in  his  sympathy  with  the  new  thoughts  that  were  agitating  the  mind 

Spaniards   or  mariners,  but  as  unto  traitors,  robbers,  made,  her  complexion  clear,  and  of  an  olive  tint.     Her 

and  murderers."    The  natives,  who  had  been  ill-treated  eyes  are  fine,  and  her  hands,  on  which  she  prides  her- 

both  by  the  Spaniards    and    the  French,  enjoyed    the  self,  small  and  delicate.     She  has  an  excellent  genius, 

consolation    of    seeing    their    enemies     butcher    one  with  much  address  and  self-command,  as  was  abund- 

another. — Bancroft,  vo1.  1.  pp.  72-3.  antly  shown  in  the  severe  trials  to  which  she  was  ex 

1  Portrait  of  Queen  Elizabeth  when  she  was  twenty-  posed  in  the  earlier  part  of  her  life.     In  her  temper  she 

three  years  old,  by   Micheli,   the  Venetian    Minister:  is  haughty  and  imperious — qualities  inherited  from  her 

"The  Princess  is  as  beautiful  in  mind  as  she  is  in  body,  fathei,  King  Henry  VIII.,  who,  from  her  resemblance 

though  her  countenance   is   rather  pleasing  from    its  to  himself,  is  said  to  have  regarded  her  with  peculiai 

expression,    than  beautiful.      She  is  large  and   well-  fondness."— Prescott's  Philip  II.,  vol.  i.  p.  278. 


BEGINNING   OF  AMERICAN  COLONIZATION.  21 

of  Europe  ;  a  companion  of  a  congenial  spirit,  Henry  of  Navarre,  with  whom, 
under  the  great  Coligny,  he  had  studied  the  art  of  war;  fired  by  a  loftier 
jmbition  than  the  men  around  him,  and  capable  of  deeds  more  exalted  than 
any  of  his  contemporaries  ;  he  had  from  the  beginning  a  most  complete  vision 
of  the  field  of  England's  future  achievements  on  the  Western  Continent.  He 
was  also  ready  to  embark  his  all  in  the  enterprise  of  establishing  her  power, 
and  making  her  civilization  shine  on  these  distant  shores.  If  Wickliff  was 
appropriately  called  the  morning- star  of  the  Reformation,  in  the  brave  and 
illuminated  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  young  America  found  her  prophetic  imper- 
sonation. 

The  free  mind  of  Raleigh  never  was  bound  by  the  fetters  of  the  past :  his 
eagle  eye  was  always  on  the  future.  Casting  the  superstitions  of  his  time  be- 
hind him,  his  heart,  which  was  all  a-glow  with  the  spirit  of  a  generous  human- 
ity, greeted  the  new  light  of  the  Reformation  which  had  already  illumined  the 
shores  of  England.  He  was  in  brain  and  heart  a  thorough  Protestant.  A 
companion  in  the  field  and  at  Court  with  Henry  of  Navarre,  who  was  to  be 
the  great  champion  for  a  while,  at  least,  of  the  cause  of  the  Huguenots,  all  his 
indignation  was  roused  at  the  massacre  of  Coligny's  friends  in  Florida,  and 
the  brutal  extermination  of  his  ill-fated  colony.  Returning  to  England,  he 
spread  something  of  his  own  enthusiasm  through  the  Court  of  Elizabeth,  who 
had  already  learned  in  person  all  that  could  be  told  of  the  southern  coast  of 
the  United  States,  from  the  helpless  men  who  had  been  saved  on  the  ocean  by 
the  little  bark  that  bore  them  to  England.  The  queen  had  also  become  fam- 
iliar with  the  reports  of  Hawkins,  who  had  befriended  the  French  settlers  on 
the  river  May,  while  artistic  illustration  was  thrown  over  the  whole  subject  by 
the  French  painter,  De  Morgues,  who  had,  under  the  patronage  of  Raleigh, 
completed  a  series  of  pictures  from  the  drawings  made  by  him  on  the  coast. 
These  pictures  were  taken  by  Raleigh  to  England,  and  representing  with 
vividness  of  color  borrowed  from  birds,  and  flowers,  and  skies,  all  the  striking 
aspects  of  the  country,  they  lent  their  gentle  ministry  to  inflame  the  fancy,  and 
warm  the  heart  of  the  virgin  queen. 

The  learning  and  patience  of  Bancroft,  which  found  so  fortunate  an  ally  in 
his  genial  style,  have  given  to  Americans  the  best  fruits  of  his  exhaustive  in- 
vestigations.1 He.  shows  how  slowly  the  idea  was  developed  of  planting  agri- 
cultural colonies  in  the  temperate  regions  of  America.  One  of  the  chief 
obstacles  it  had  to  encounter  was  the  belief,  which  outlived  the  dying  hours 
of  Columbus  and  for  a  long  time  filled  the  common  mind,  that  America  was 
only  a  portion  of  the  great  Asiatic  continent.     Henry  VII.  being  a  Catholic, 

1  The  expeditions  of  the  Cabots,  though  they  had  re-  point  in  the  compass,  and  the  incidental  right  to  inhabit 

vealed  a  continent  of  easy  access,  in  a  temperate  zone,  the  regions  which  should  be  found  ;  there  is,  however, 

had  failed  to  discover  a  passage  to  the  Indies,  and  their  no  proof  that  a  voyage  was  made  under  the  authority 

fame  was  dimmed  by  that  cf  Vasco  da  Gaina,  whose  of  this  commission.    In  December  of  the  following  year, 

achievement  made   Lisbon  the  emporium   of  Europe,  a  new  grant  in  part  to  the  same  patentees,  promised  a 

Thorn  and  Eliot  of  Bristol,  visited  Newfoundland  prob-  forty  years'  monopoly  of  trade,  an  equally  wide  scope 

ably  in  1502  ;    in  that  year  savages  in  wild  attire  were  for  adventure,  and  larger  favor  to  the  alien  associates  ; 

exhibited  to  the  king  ;  but  North  America  as  yet  invited  but,  even  these  great  privileges  seem  not  to  have  beer 

no  colony,  for  it  promised  no  sudden  wealth,  while  the  followed  by  an  expedition.     The  only  connection  which 

Indies  more  and  more  inflamed  commercial  cupidity,  as  yet  existed  between  England  and  the  New  World 

In  March,  1501,  Henry  VII.  granted  an  exclusive  privi-  was  with  Newfoundland  and  its  fisheries. — Bancroft, 

lege  of  trade  to  a  company  composed  half  of  English-  vol.  i.  p.  75. 
men,  half  of  Portuguese,  with  leave  to  sail  towards  any 


22  HOW  ENGLAND  BEGAN  TO  COLONIZE  THE    NEW  WORLD. 

was  obliged,  in  some  sort,  to  recognize  the  paramount  title  of  Spain  to  North 
America,  which  she  had  received  from  the  Pope.  He  cultivated  the  Spanish 
alliance  with  a  view  to  the  projected  marriage  of  his  son  and  successor  with 
Catherine  of  Aragon,  the  youngest  daughter  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella.  But 
the  subsequent  repudiation  of  Catherine  bringing  the  political  alliance  to  an 
end,  left  Henry  VIII.  free  to  display  the  banner  of  St.  George  wherever  he 
liked,  and  some  encouragement  was  given  to  the  cultivation  of  English  com- 
merce ;  especially  the  fisheries  of  Newfoundland,  which  were  favored  by  the 
first  Act  of  Parliament  which  makes  any  reference  to  America. 

The  English  were  now  beginning  to  assert  their  supremacy  as  sailors  on 
perilous  seas,  from  the  heart  of  the  Tropics  to  the  gates  of  the  Pole.  Poor 
'  bloody  Mary '  of  England  had  indeed  chosen  the  King  of  Spain  for  a  husband  ; 
but  the  alliance  had  soon  ended,  and  for  a  long  time  peaceful  intercourse  be- 
tween these  two  rival  maritime  nations  was  suspended  by  the  wreck  of  the 
grand  Armada  off  the  coast  of  England,  and  the  triumph  of  Protestantism, 
which  breathed  a  new  and  loftier  spirit  through  the  nation. 

But  the  old  vision  of  the  North-western  Passage  to  Asia  still  haunted  the 
dreams  of  all  the  navigators  of  Europe.  Pondering  for  many  years  on  the 
scheme  for  its  discovery,  that  famous  seaman,  Martin  Frobisher,  discouraged 
by  no  refusal  to  his  implorations  in  any  or  all  quarters,  at  last  found  a  hearing 
with  Dudley,  Earl  of  Warwick,  to  whom  he  said,  '  The  only  thing  of  the 
world  yet  left  undone,  by  which  a  noble  minde  might  be  made  famous  and  for- 
tunate, is  the  discovery  of  the  North  western  Passage.'  And  that  great  noble- 
man enabled  him  to  fit  out  two  little  barks,  of  twenty,  and  five-and- twenty 
tons,  with  a  pinnace  of  ten  only ;  and  with  these  he  started  from  London 
[June  8th].  The  Court  went  to  see  the  tiny  fleet  drop  down  the  Thames; 
and  Queen  Elizabeth  from  the  bank  waved  a  farewell  token  to  this  bold  rover 
of  the  seas. 

Little  could  be  expected  from  this  cockleshell  expedition.  The  first  storm 
swallowed  up  the  pinnace  ;  the  crew  of  the  Michael  turned  her  prow  back,  in 
fright,  to  England :  but  the  unterrified  Frobisher  went  on  his  way  unattended 
to  the  shores  of  Labrador.  Entering  an  inlet,  he  mistook  the  opening  of  Hud- 
son's Bay — of  which  he  was  the  real  discoverer — for  the  long  sought  passage 
between  Asia  and  America,  and  he  believed  that  by  sailing  onward  he  would 
strike  the  Pacific.  But  this  bold  expedition  ended  only  in  taking  some  of  the 
rocks  and  rubbish  of  the  region  on  board,  to  make  the  Queen  of  England's 
claim  to  the  sovereignty  of  the  territory  good ;  and  in  showing  to  his  country- 
men one  native,  which,  after  the  style  of  the  age,  he  considered  it  necessary 
to  steal,  to  give  eclat  to  his  expedition. 

But  he  was  gratified  by  having  the  jewellers  of  London  announce  that  the 
stones  he  had  brought  back  contained  gold.  This  inflamed  the  cupidity  of  the 
merchants.  They  offered  to  purchase  a  lease  of  the  new  lands  from  the 
Queen,  with  the  idea  of  working  them  for  gold.  The  rush  to  join  the  new  ex- 
pedition was  unprecedented.  Even  the  Queen  caught  the  fever,  and  contributed 
one  ship  at  her  own  expense,  going  into  partnership  with  the  concern. 


HARTIN- 


MARTIN  FROBISHEK'S  SECOND  EXPEDITION.  23 

May  27,  1577. — After  all  hands  had  received  the  holy  communion,  the 
Expedition  sailed  for  the  Northern  El  Dorado,  and  a  '  merrie  wind'  swept 
them  off  into  the  Polar  Seas.  The  illimitable  fields  of  icebergs  were  illu- 
minated by  the  almost  endless  day  of  those  weird  but  treacherous  latitudes, 
and  reaching  the  coast,  their  first  eager  clutch  was  for  the  golden  stones. 
They  found  spiders,  Hakluyt  says,  in  abundance,  creeping  over  the  soil,  and 
they  were  '  true  signs  of  great  stores  of  gold.'  Without  the  delay  of  a  care- 
ful analysis — even  had  they  been  capable  of  it — they  pitched  the  worthless 
stuff  by  the  shovelful  on  board  their  vessels,  the  great  Admiral  Frobisher 
himself  working  with  more  than  the  strength  and  zeal  of  a  common  laborer. 

1578. — Before  the  smoke  of  the  expedition  had  died  away,  a  formidable 
fleet  of  fifteen  sail,  under  the  encouragement  of  Elizabeth,  who  had  con- 
tributed towards  the  expense,  was  made  ready.  One  hundred  picked  men 
were  chosen  to  found  a  colony  in  the  midst  of  a  treeless  region,  with  no  den- 
izens but  a  few  dwarfed  Esquimaux  and  wild  animals  wandering  over  the  ice. 
Some  of  the  sons  of  the  gentry  of  England  had  volunteered.  This  expedition 
was  to  search  for  no  undiscovered  passage  to  a  golden  Cathay.  Frobisher 
was  to  lead  them  to  a  region  where  the  soil  itself  was  gold — a  boundless 
Peru.  But  it  was  a  doomed  expedition.  His  vessels  were  scattered,  crushed 
by  icebergs,  bewildered  in  unknown  frozen  seas,  glad  at  last  to  reach  any 
haven,  which  most  of  them  did  in  what  has  since  been  known  as  Countess 
Warwick  Sound.  But  the  attractions  of  the  new  territories  were  not  strong 
enough  to  repress  the  rising  spirit  of  mutiny.  One  of  the  vessels  which  held 
a  large  share  of  the  provisions  for  the  colony,  deserted  its  companions  and 
escaped  to  England.  But  the  Admiral  discovered  an  island  which  he  de- 
clared held  black  ore  ■  to  suffice  all  the  gold-gluttons  of  the  world.'  But 
except  to  illustrate  the  hardihood  and  endurance  of  the  British  sailor,  and  the 
fair  claim  that  England  was  laying  to  her  maritime  supremacy,  no  results 
came  from  the  expedition.  Even  Queen  Elizabeth  made  a  poor  speculation, 
for  once,  and  her  eye  was  turned  for  the  main  chance  in  another  direction. 

Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert. — -June  11,  1578. — At  every  period  when  new  ideas 
are  agitating  the  common  mind,  and  the  passions  of  the  superficial  and  the 
vulgar  are  inflamed  by  the  excitements  of  objects  that  are  near  and  dazzling, 
some  men  appear,  of  sounder  sense,  and  greater  comprehension.  They  see 
the  substance,  while  others  chase  the  shadow.  By  a  divine  intuition  they  feel 
the  approach  of  coming  events.  Their  counsels  at  last  prevail.  Some  schemes 
are  devised,  so  well  laid  that  they  end  in  great  practical  results.  Order  springs 
from  confusion  ;  incoherence  of  floating  material  is  followed  by  crystallization, 
and  the  forces  which  were  wasting  themselves  in  fruitless  attrition,  are  directed 
to  the  accomplishment  of  something  of  common  good  to  mankind.  Such 
men  are  the  mainstays  of  civilization ;  in  them  are  treasured  up  the  hopes  of 
•■he  future. 

England  has  always  been  blessed  with  more  than  her  share  of  such  men, 


-4  HOW  ENGLAND  WAS   TO  LEAD    CIVILIZATION. 

In  glancing  back  over  her  history,  we  encounter  the  sturdy  champions  of 
truth,  on  every  road  of  advancement,  in  explorations,  whether  on  land  or  seas; 
or  in  the  broad  realm  of  science.  The  period  through  which  England  was  now 
passing,  more  deeply  concerns  America  than  any  that  had  preceded,  or  per- 
haps any  that  was  to  follow.  We  approach  the  two  most  important  events 
that  happened  on  this  continent,  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 
One  was  the  establishment  of  the  colony  of  Virginia ;  the  other,  that  which 
was  founded  on  Plymouth  Rock.  And  we  are  now  stepping  upon  firm  ground. 
Our  rapid  flight  through  the  first  century  that  passed  over  the  grave  of  Colum- 
bus, has  been  but  the  flight  of  the  wild  bird  through  the  fogs  of  the  ocean,  on 
its  way  to  the  clearer  skies  of  the  continent.  Hereafter  England  comes  nearer 
to  us  :  we  shake  hands  familiarly  with  her  great  men.  Her  anchors  were  now 
to  be  cast  in  new  waters,  whose  finny  treasures  were  to  be  worth  more  than 
the  gold  mines  of  the  world.  She  was  to  begin  to  set  up  landmarks  here,  that 
were  never  to  be  obliterated.  She  was  coming,  with  the  precious  seed  to 
cast  forth  into  a  bleak  wilderness,  that  was  to  furnish  a  harvest  for  man- 
kind. Poor,  despised,  unprotected,  and  unnoticed,  as  these  early  missionaries 
of  civilization  may  have  been,  they  were  the  avant-courriers  of  a  new  age. 
Overwhelmed  as  many  of  them  were  to  be  by  disappointments,  and  severe  as 
were  the  hardships  they  were  to  go  through  ;  hard  as  then  seemed  to  be  the 
fate  which  was  to  doom  thousands  to  untold  sufferings,  and  whole  expeditions 
to  ruin,  still,  the  first  step  had  been  taken.  Unpromising  as  it  was  to  the 
common  mind  of  England,  the  idea  of  the  colonization  of  America  was  begin- 
ning to  dawn,  and  the  full  daybreak  was  not  far  off. 

Cabot's  discovery  of  the  Newfoundland  fisheries  at  once  attracted  the  at 
tention  of  a  wonderful  race  of  sea-faring  men,  that  had  sprung  by  legitimate 
descent  from  the  Vikings  of  the  north,  who,  from  the  dim  ages  had  held  as 
their  own  those  wide  reaches  of  chilly  waters  that  were  waging  their  ceaseless 
conflict  as  they  mingled  from  the  Western  Atlantic  and  the  North  German 
Ocean.  The  Normans,  the  Bretons,  the  Danes,  the  Norwegians,  the  Swedes, 
— had  whitened  the  banks  of  Newfoundland  with  the  sails  of  their  fishing 
smacks.  To  them  are  we  indebted  for  maintaining  commercial  relations  with 
the  New  World,  while  France  and  England  were  doing  so  little  for  so  long  a 
time,  to  avail  themselves  of  the  important  discoveries  which  their  navigators 
had  made.  The  coast  of  America  had  come  nearer  to  Europe.  The  old 
route  by  the  Canaries  and  the  West  Indies  was  being  gradually  abandoned, 
and  the  direct  passage  across  the  Atlantic  adopted  by  the  later  navigators. 
It  had  come  to  be  an  easier  matter  to  reach  New  England  and  the  Carolinas. 

Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert  was  one  of  those  men  to  whom  we  are  now  to  pay 
a  tribute  of  admiration  and  gratitude,  for  he  led  the  way  to  the  colonization 
of  the  United  States ;  and  although  he  seemed  to  accomplish  little,  yet  he 
was  the  first  pioneer  on  the  new  road.  He  had  watched  with  care,  and 
studied  and  written  much  on  navigation  ;  he  had  distinguished  himself  as  a 
soldier,  and  in  Parliament ;  his  soul  scorned  danger  and  impiety  alike.  Loyal 
to  his  sovereign,  and  true  to  his  own  honor,  he  wrote  his  own  motto,  which 


THK  LAST  MOMENTS  02  6IU  HUMPHREY    GILBERT. 


SIR  HUMPHREY  GILBERT'S  TWO  EXPEDITIONS.  25 

was  the  guide  of  his  life.  'Death,  I  know,'  he  said,  'is  inevitable  ;  but  the 
fame  of  virtue  is  immortal.'  He  applied  to  the  Queen  for  a  patent,  to  be 
permanent  and  perpetual,  if  he  should  establish  his  plantation  within  six  years. 
All  he  asked  for  was  granted.  Walter  Raleigh  was  his  half-brother  j  and  with 
aim  he  held  long  and  earnest  consultations  which  were  to  be  attended  with 
such  lasting  results. 

Gilberts  Expedition.— June  n,  1578. — It  is  strange  there  should  be 
any  doubt  on  such  a  subject,  but  it  is  questionable  if  Raleigh  embarked  in 
this  expedition.  It  matters  little,  however,  for  it  was  attended  with  immediate 
misfortune,  and  compelled  to  put  back. 

June,  1583. — It  was  four  years  before  Gilbert  had  recovered  sufficiently 
from  this  disaster,  in  which  he  had  lost  one  of  his  ships,  and  impaired  hi? 
fortune,  to  be  able  to  equip  a  new  squadron.  But  the  indomitable  energy 
of  Raleigh,  with  his  ample  fortune,  was  sufficient  for  the  emergency;  and  the 
expedition  stood  so  high  at  court  that  it  started  with  most  auspicious  omens. 
Elizabeth  had  given  to  the  commander  an  anchor  of  gold,  guided  by  a  lady, 
in  token  of  her  favor  ;J  and  in  June,  1583,  he  sailed  from  the  port  of  Plymouth. 
But  disasters  were  still  in  store  for  him.  In  two  days  after  leaving  port,  his 
largest  vessel,  which  had  been  equipped  entirely  by  Raleigh,  deserted,  and, 
under  pretext  of  the  breaking  out  of  an  infectious  disease,  left  her  companions. 
But  Gilbert  continued  his  voyage,  and  reached  Newfoundland  in  safety. 
Here  he  erected  a  pillar,  with  the  Arms  of  England  on  a  monument ;  and 
proclaiming  the  sovereignty  of  his  Queen  over  the  land,  granted  deeds  of  the 
soil  to  British  fishermen ;  took  vast  quantities  of  what  he  deemed  to  be  the 
precious  ore  on  board  his  largest  ship,  and  with  the  only  three  vessels  left 
him,  sailed  up  along  the  coast  of  New  England.  But  his  large  ship  was 
wrecked  with  her  golden  cargo,  and  a  hundred  of  his  best  men  perished.  He 
turned  back  to  his  native  country  in  a  little  bark  of  only  ten  tons ;  attended 
by  the  Hind.  As  she  seemed  to  be  going  down,  the  brave  Gilbert  was  seen 
sitting  in  the  stern  of  his  little  Squirrel,  holding  up  a  book — probably  the 
Bible, — and  shouting  to  them, — 'We  are  as  neere  heaven  by  sea  as  by  land,' 
night  came  down  over  the  two  little  struggling  waifs.  At  midnight  the  lights 
of  the  Squirrel  disappeared.  The  Hind  reached  the  harbor  of  Falmouth, 
bearing  the  news  that  she  was  the  last  England  would  ever  see  of  the  squadron 
of  the  brave  Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert.3 

1  To  form  part  of  Gilbert's  fleet,  Raleigh  built  a  For  the  rest  I  leave  it  to  our  meeting,  or  to  the  report 

ship  ami  bestowed  on  it  his  own  name,  with  which  aid  of  this  bearer,  who  would  needs  be   the  messenger  of 

Gilbert  was  constrained  to  content  himself.     At  length  this  good  news.     So  I  commend  you  to  the  will  and 

his  little  fleet,  manned,  victualled  and  ready  for  sea,  protection  of  God,  who  sends  us  such  life  or  death  as 

was  collected  on  the  Devonshire  coast,  where  he  re-  he  shall  please  or  hath  appointed." — St.  John's  Life 

ceived  the  following  letter  from  Raleigh, — "  Brother,  I  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  vol.  i.  p.  113. 
have  sent  you  a  token  from  her  majesty — an  anchor,  a  Away  went    the  gallant    explorer    towards   the 

guided  by  a  lady — as  you  see  ;  and  further,  her  high-  West,  and  for  several  months  kept  moving  to  and  fro 

ness  willed  me  to  send  you  word,  that  she  wished  you  over  the  ocean,  his  little  fleet  now  dispersed,   now  col« 

as  great  good  hap  and  safety  to  your  ship  as  if  herself  lected,  till  on  the  9th  of  September,  he  was  beheld  foi 

were  there  in  person,  desirrng  you  to  have  care  of  your-  the  last  time  reclining  on  the  deck  of  his  vessel,  eithei 

self  as  of  that  which  she   tendereth,  and   therefore  for  reading  or  consulting  some  chart.     Night  then  closed 

ner  sake,  you  must  provide  for  it  accordingly  ;  further,  in,  rough  and  boisterous,  and  when  the  morning  of  the 

she  commandeth  that  you  leave  your  picture  with  me.  10th  dawned,  Gilbert's  ship  could  nowhere  be  seen  up- 


26  RALEIGH  LORD  PROPRIETARY  OF    VIRGINIA. 

1584. — But  the  ardor  of  Raleigh  was  not  to  be  dampened  by  the  miscarriage 
of  the  expedition,  ntor  the  sad  fate  of  his  kinsman.  He  had  matured  a  plan 
for  a  wiser  expedition.  Never  infatuated  by  the  passion  for  gold,  and  guided 
by  higher  intelligence  than  his  contemporaries,  he  determined  to  risk  another 
portion  of  his  fortune  in  establishing  a  settlement  in  the  milder  regions  of  the 
south.  On  the  28th  of  March,  Elizabeth  granted  him  an  ample  patent,  con- 
stituting him  Lord  Proprietary  over  the  regions  where  he  was  to  establish  his 
colony ;  and  the  minds  of  the  adventurous  being  inflamed  by  visions  of  a  balmy 
country,  where  the  reign  of  perpetual  fruitfulness  was  never  checked  by  the 
inclemencies  of  winter,  the  expedition  was  soon  ready,  and  the  command  of 
it  given  to  Philip  Amidas  and  Arthur  Barlow.  Being  a  southern  expedition, 
they  took  the  southern  route,  by  the  Canaries  and  the  West  Indies.  On 
the  27th  of  April  they  had  left  England,  and  after  a  short  stay  in  the  West 
Indies,  they  reached  the  shores  of  Carolina  on  the  2d  of  July.  In  describing 
the  fragrance  which  filled  the  air  as  it  came  off  the  coast,  one  of  the  writers 
of  the  expedition  says  it  was  i  as  if  they  had  been  in  the  midst  of  some  delicate 
garden,  abounding  in  all  kinds  of  odoriferous  flowers.'  l  One  hundred  and 
twenty  miles  to  the  north,  they  glided  into  the  calm  water  of  the  island  of 
Wocoken,  near  the  opening  of  Ocracock  inlet.  The  scene  which  opened  upon 
the  eyes  of  these  adventurers,  accustomed  as  they  were  to  the  foggy  skies 
and  wild  elements  of  the  British  Isles,  filled  them  with  rapture. 

It  was  in  the  depth  of  summer  : — '  the  sea  was  tranquil ;  no  storms  were 
gathering ;  the  air  was  agitated  by  none  but  the  gentlest  breezes ;  and  the 
English  commanders  were  in  raptures  with  the  beauty  of  the  ocean,  seen  in 
the  magnificence  of  repose,  gemmed  with  islands,  and  expanding  in  the  clearest 
transparency  from  cape  to  cape.  The  vegetation  of  that  southern  latitude 
struck  the  beholders  with  admiration  ;  the  trees  had  not  their  paragons  in 
the  world ;  the  luxuriant  vines,  as  they  clambered  up  the  loftiest  cedars, 
formed  graceful  festoons ;  grapes  were  so  plenty  upon  every  Hate  shrub,  that 
the  surge  of  the  ocean,  as  it  lazily  rolled  in  upon  the  shore  with  the  quiet 
winds  of  summer,  dashed  its  spray  upon  the  clusters  ;  and  the  natural  arbors 
formed  an  impervious  shade,  so  that  not  a  ray  of  the  suns  of  July  could 
penetrate.  The  forests  were  filled  with  birds ;  and,  at  the  discharge  of  an 
arquebuss,  whole  flocks  would  arise,  uttering  a  cry,  which  the  many  echoes 
redoubled,  till  it  seemed  as  if  an  army  of  men  had  shouted  together.'  2 

Suspicions  of  violence  and  injustice  from  all  new-comers  to  their  peaceful 
shores,  had  long  haunted  the  minds  of  their  gentle  inhabitants  ;  but,  unable  to 
restrain  their  curiosity  and  desire  for  traffic,  they  gradually  accepted  the  ad- 

on  the  waters.     The  brave  adventurer  had  perished  ;  where  the   grapes   in  "  Bacchanal   profusion   reel    to 

the  survivors  returned  to  England  with  the  evil  tidings,  earth,"  and  cedars,  loftier  than  those  of  Lebanon,  wave 

which,  instead  of  disheartening,  only   the  more  stimu-  along  the  breezy  heights.     To  enter  into  minute  details 

lated  Raleigh  to  pursue  and  complete  the  design  his  would  be  to  invade  a  field  so  ably  and  honorably  culti- 

brother  had  formed. — St.  John's  Life  of  Sir  Walter  vated  by  the  historians  of  America,  who  speak  affec- 

RaUigh,  vol.  i.  p.  1 13-14.  tionately  of  Raleigh  as  the  remote  father  of  their  repub- 

1  Barlow  describes  the  incidents  of  the  voyage  with  lie,  in  which  two   cities   have   been   erected  as  monu- 

ability  and  enthusiasm.     Along  the  coasts  of  Florida  ments  to  his  memory. — St.  John's  Life  0/  Sir  IVai 

ind  Carolina,  they  enjoyed,  while  yet  beyond  sight  of  ter  Raleigh,  vol.  i.  pp.  120-130. 
land,  "  Sabaean  odors  from  the  spicy  shores,"  not  indeed  a  Battcroft,  vol.  1.  p.  93. 

of  Araby  the  blest,  but  of  a  far  richer  and  lovelier  land, 


KaLEIGH'S  EXPEDITION  lTNDER  AMID  AS  AND  BARLOW   2», 

yances  of  the  English,  and  their  relations  became  so  friendly  that  the  wife  of 
Granganimeo,  who  was  the  father  of  the  King  Wingina,  entertained  them  at 
her  Arcadian  residence  on  the  Island  of  Roanoke.  In  the  account  of  the 
voyage  by  Amidas  and  Barlow,  which  Hakluyt  has  preserved,  they  said  :  'The 
people  were  most  gentle,  loving,  and  faithful,  void  of  all  guile,  and  such  as 
lived  after  the  manner  of  the  golden  age.'  Something  better  than  treachery 
and  blood  were  to  be  hoped  for  now,  and  something  better  actually  followed. 
Nothing,  however,  beyond  a  partial  examination  of  Roanoke  Island  and 
Pamlico  and  Albemarle  Sound,  and  a  general  survey  of  the  coast  was  attempted  : 
and  after  a  few*  weeks  delightfully  spent,  having  persuaded  two  attractive 
natives  of  the  forest  to  accompany  them,  they  took  Manteo  and  Wanchese 
aboard,  and  sailed  on  their  return  voyage  to  England.  But  they  were  prepared 
to  give  glowing  accounts  of  the  paradise  world  they  had  revelled  in.  .  They 
told  the  story  of  their  charming  sails  over  the  summer  seas,  and  among  ■  the 
hundred  enchanted  islands,'  and  so  delighted  was  Elizabeth  with  the  whole 
affair,  that  she  named  the  fair  land  after  herself.  Virginia  now  at  least  had  a 
name,  which  the  deeds  of  her  sons  were  to  emblazon  among  the  most  brilliant 
records  of  the  Caucasian  race. 

Raleigh  had  now  become  a  member  of  Parliament,  received  the  honors  of 
knighthood  for  his  valor  as  a  soldier  in  other  fields ;  and  as  a  reward  for  the 
discoveries  his  expedition  had  made,  a  new  patent,  confirming  his  rights  to  the 
regions  discovered,  and  encouraging  to  a  new  and  broader  scheme  for  coloni- 
zation ; '  a  lucrative  monopoly  of  wines  was  also  granted  to  him.  Although  he 
entered  warmly  into  another  attempt  to  discover  the  Northwest  passage,  and 
contributed  generously  to  equipping  the  expedition,  and  assisted  in  the  voyages 
in  which  the  discoveries  of  Davis  were  made  in  the  Arctic  Sea,  he  still  pur- 
sued with  greater  earnestness  his  plan  for  colonizing  Virginia. 

April  9,  1585. — A  squadron  of  seven  vessels,  carrying  one  hundred  and 
eight  colonists,  was  now  fitted  out  for  the  shores  of  Carolina.  Resolute  upon 
founding  a  permanent  colony,  and  careful  in  all  his  preparations,  he  chose  for 
his  Governor,  Ralph  Lane,  a  well-known  soldier  ;  and  as  the  commander  of 
the  expedition  one  of  the  most  gallant  and  brilliant  of  his  own  friends,  Sir 
Richard  Grenville.  There  were  also  on  board  that  fleet,  other  men,  whose 
names  were  to  ring  through  the  world.  Hariot,  the  historian  of  the  expedi- 
tion, became  the  inventor  of  the  system  of  rotation  in  modern  algebra ; 
Cavendish  was  afterwards  to  circumnavigate  the  globe  ;  and  White,  one  of  the 
best  painters  of  his  day,  made  the  most  valuable  artistic  contribution  yet 
furnished,  by  his  sketches  of  the  Indians  and  their  habits  of  life. 

1  His  American  grant  filled  him  with  hopes,  the  vast-  To  the  health  and  pleasure  of  mankind  he  was  like- 
ness of  which  he  was  careful  never  to  reveal  :  though  wise  to  contribute  largely  by  the  introduction  into  Eu- 
they  again  and  again  urged  him  to  lavish  his  revenue  rope  of  that  article,  the  mere  duty  upon  which,  during 
on  colonizing  enterprises  never  destined  to  bear  fruit,  the  year  in  which  I  write,  contributes  nearly  seven 
With  all  the  power  of  his  intellect,  and  acute  insight  into  millions  sterling  to  the  revenues  of  his  country,  while 
the  nature  of  things,  he  yet  found  it  impossible  to  fore-  its  use  constitutes  the  solace  of  all  classes,  from  the 
see  to  what  extent  he  should  become,  by  the  steps  he  Prince  to  the  hodman.  If  Great  Britain,  therefore, 
was  then  taking,  the  benefactor  of  the  human  race  ;  should  ever  think  of  repaying  with  a  statue  the  debt  of 
how  many  millions,  through  generation  after  generation,  gratitude  it  owes  to  Raleigh,  there  should  be  placed  on 
should  owe  to  him  their  daily  food,  so  that  next  after  the  lofty  brow  a  wreath  composed  of  die  tobacco-leaf 
the  inventor  of  corn,  he  should  most  deserve  the  bless-  and  the  potato-flower. — St.  John's  Life  0/ Sir  Walter 
tugs  of  his  !  pedes.  Raleighy  vol.  i.  p.  134-5. 


28      RALEIGH'S  NEXT  EXPEDITION  UNDER   GRENVILLE. 

June  26,  1585. — The  fleet  cast  anchor  at  the  Island  of  Roanoke.  Man 
teo,  who  had  been  fascinated  by  his  visit  to  England,  returned  with  the  expe- 
dition, and  went  ashore  to  announce  his  arrival.  This  time  a  warmer  welcome 
was  extended  to  the  new-comers,  and  the  best  hospitalities  were  offered,  with 
guides  for  the  exploration  of  the  coast  and  harbors,  which  was  effectually  done 
by  Grenville,  Lane,  Cavendish,  Hariot,  and  White.  But  an  unfortunate  cir- 
cumstance occurred,  which  was  to  cast  a  deep  shadow  over  the  fortunes  of 
the  little  colony.  A  silver  cup  belonging  to  some  one  in  the  party  was  miss* 
ing.  Its  restoration  was  demanded,  and  when  delayed  Grenville,  in  his 
madness,  gave  up  the  village,  and  all  the  standing  corn  of  the  natives,  to  fire. 
But  a  favorable  site  being  selected,  the  colony  was  landed,  and  Grenville 
sailed  for  England.  Encountering  a  valuable  Spanish  prize  on  the  voyage,  it 
enriched  the  enterprise ;  and  as  the  news  soon  spread  from  Plymouth  through 
England,  Grenville  was  greeted  by  the  shouts  of  the  populace,  and  the  favor 
of  the  Queen. 

After  a  pretty  thorough  exploration  of  the  surrounding  country,  Governor 
Lane,  in  his  first  letter  to  Raleigh,  paints  the  following  picture — Sept.  3  : 
'It  is  the  goodliest  soil  under  the  cope  of  heaven ;  the  most  pleasing  terri- 
tory of  the  world.  The  continent  is  of  a  huge  and  unknown  greatness,  and 
very  well  peopled  and  towned,  though  savagely.  The  climate  is  so  wholesome 
we  have  not  one  sick  since  we  touched  the  land.  If  Virginia  had  but  horses 
and  kine,  and  were  peopled  with  English,  no  realm  in  Christendom  were  com 
parable  to  it.' 

The  most  reliable  accounts  were,  however,  furnished  by  Hariot,  who  was 
a  keen  observer.  He  seized  at  once  upon  three  great  points  that  successive 
centuries  were  to  develop  as  the  sources  of  the  vast  wealth  of  Virginia. 
The  natives  were  smoking  a  weed  of  strange  aroma,  and  which  produced  still 
stranger  effects.  They  had  received  it  as  a  gift  from  the  Great  Spirit ;  they 
believed  in  its  healing  virtues,  and  even  Hariot  himself  soon  became  a  con- 
vert to  their  belief,  and  learned  to  smoke  the  pipe  of  peace  with  the  enthusi- 
asm of  a  new  disciple.1  Around  their  villages  he  looked  with  delight  at  per- 
haps the  most  beautiful  of  all  the  products  of  the  fields,  waving  in  the  breezes 

1  Hariot,  whose   story  is   closely  linked  with   that  familiarly  beside  her  favorite  while  he  smoked,  chatting, 

of  Raleigh,  from  the  dawn  of  these  colonial  enterprises  laughing,    and  laying  wagers.     Once  she   objected  to 

to   the  later  colloquys  in  the  Bloody  Tower,  took,  in  him  that,  with  all  his  ingenuity,  he  could  not  tell  the 

Virginia,  to  the  smoking  of  tobacco,  the  numerous  vir-  weight  of  the   smoke.      '  Your  majesty  must   excuse 

tues  of  which  he  celebrates  ;  and  on  his  return  to  Eng-  me,'  replied  Raleigh,  'for   the   thing   is    quite    easy.' 

land,    infected    the    lord-proprietor    with    his    newly  Elizabeth  was  incredulous,  and  laid  a  bet  that  he  could 

acquired  taste.     Pipes,  shag,  and  tankards  of  ale  were  not  do  what  he  said.     '  Your  majesty  shall  be  the  judge,' 

consequently  familiar  to  Raleigh's    apartments  in  the  he  answered,  and  sending  for  a  small  quantity  of  to- 

palace,  and  led  to  several  comic  incidents  which  the  bacco,  and  weighing  it  in  her  presence,  he  puc  it  into 

newsmongers    of    the    time    industriously    circulated,  his  silver  pipe,  which  had  probably  a  capacious  bowl, 

When  the  Red  Men  indulged  in  this  luxury,  they  in-  and  went  on  smoking  till  the  whole  was  consumed, 

haled  the  intoxicating  fumes  through  pipes  made  of  Then    placing  the  ashes   in   the  scales  and  weighing 

clay  ;    for  which   Raleigh   substituted   pipes  of  silver,  them,  he  pointed  out  to  Elizabeth  that  the  difference 

while  our  rustic  countrymen,  when  the  practice  spread,  indicated  the  weight  of  the  smoke.     The  Queen  laugh- 

jould  devise  nothing  better  than  a  split  walnut-shell,  ingly  paid  the  money,  saying,  in  allusion  to  the  alcheni- 

into  which  they  inserted  a  straw.  ists,  that  she  had  heard  of  many  who  turned  their  gold 

One  day  Raleigh,  intending  to  enjoy  in  his  library  into  smoke,  but  till  then  never  knew  any  one  who  could 

the  new  outlandish  luxury,  sent  i  servant  for  a  tankard  turn  smoke  into  gold.     Erom  the  date  of  that  memora- 

cf  ale,  and  then  sat  down  to  his  pipe.     When  the  man  ble  wager,  the  use  of  tobacco  gained  ground  in  Eng 

returned,  observing  his  master  enveloped  in  smoke,  he  land,  so  that  it  may  now  almost  be  said  to  perfume  th« 

threw  the  ale  over  him,  and  then,  in  the  greatest  terror,  whole  island,  from  John  o'Groat's  to  the  Land's  End.— 

ran  down-stairs,  shouting  as  he  went,  that  Sir  Walter  St.  John's   Life  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  vol.  L  p 

fcas  on  fire.  i37"9« 

We  sometimes  find  the  gieat  Tudor  Queen  sitting 


GRENVILLE,  LANE,   CAVENDISH,   HARIOT,   WHITE.         29 

of  summer,  and  filled  with  amazement  at  its  productiveness  and  facility  of 
cultivation,  he  saw  no  danger  of  famine.  Almost  without  culture,  huge  tub- 
erous roots  seemed  to  multiply  themselves  under  the  surface  of  the  soil,  and 
supply  a  most  agreeable  and  healthy  food. 

In  these  three  great  staples — tobacco,  maize,  and  the  potato — lay  sources 
of  wealth  in  the  fertile  soil,  which,  as  they  became  a  substitute,  in  culture, 
for  the  maddening  passion  for  gold,  were  to  enrich  the  whole  continent,  and 
one  of  which — the  potato — was  to  save  nations  from  famine. 

And  probably  on  the  whole  continent  of  America,  none  of  the  native 
tribes  could  be  found  who  might  more  readily  have  been  at  once  introduced 
into  the  pale  of  Christian  civilization.1  Partaking  of  the  softness  of  the 
climate  which  had  tempered  the  native  ferocity  of  the  savage  ;  hospitable  in 
disposition,  and  quick  to  reciprocate  any  favor ;  looking  upon  white  men  with 
all  their  imposing  array  of  mysterious  implements  of  power,  and  devices  for 
comfort  and  luxury ;  firm  in  their  belief  of  a  future  life,  and  the  existence  of 
a  God  of  justice ;  with  clear  conceptions  at  least  of  one  Almighty  undivided 
Power,  which  they  worshipped  as  the  Great  Spirit ;  feeling  that  they  were  yet 
holding  intercourse  with  the  departed  of  their  tribe,  who  were  still  conscious 
of  their  existence  and  pursuits  : — how  easy  it  would  have  been  for  these  men, 
who  were  regarded  as  the  favorites  of  heaven,  to  bring  the  tawny  worshippers 
of  a  common  Father  within  the  sacred  fold  of  Christ.  Everywhere  they  went, 
Hariot  tells  us  that  he  showed  the  Bible,  and,  as  best  he  could,  explained  its 
precepts  as  a  divine  revelation  from  heaven.  They  embraced  the  sacred 
volume ;  they  clasped  it  to  their  breasts ;  they  pressed  it  on  their  heads  ; 
they  kissed  it ;  they  were  ready  to  listen  to  the  story  of  the  Man  of  Naza- 
reth, and  the  universal  love,  as  well  as  the  infinite  power  of  the  Creator  of 
all  things.  The  annalist  tells  us,  that,  as  the  colonists  brought  no  women 
with  them,  the  Indians  imagined  that  they  were  not  born  of  woman,  and 
therefore  were  immortal,  or  else  that  they  were  of  former  generations  who 
had  descended  to  the  earth,  to  die  no  more.  When  they  saw  the  clock,  with 
its  incomprehensible  mechanism  and  its  invisible  tick,  marking  on  its  dial  the 
passing  moments  of  time ;  when  they  saw  the  burning-glass  light  fire  in  the 
dry  wood  and  grass;  and  the  pen  gliding  over  paper,  making  signs  that  car- 
ried information  to  other  persons,  when  they  were  read — they  seemed  to  be 
entertaining  gods,  and  not  mortals.  But  when  they  saw  the  flash  of  burning 
gunpowder,  and  the  bullet  strike  death  through  the  swift-winged  or  fleet- 
footed  game,  they  were  filled  with  terror.  The  air  was  at  once  peopled  with 
hosts  of  invisible  spirits ;  and  when  sickness  seized  them,  they  believed  that 

1  The  inhabitants  are  described  as  too  feeble  to  in-  whole  country  could  not  muster  more  than  seven  or 

spire  terror;  clothed  in  mantles  and  aprons  of  deer-  eight  hundred  fighting  men.     The  dialect  of  each  gov- 

skins  ;  having  no  weapons  but  wooden   swords,    and  emment  seemed  a  language   by  itself.     The   country 

bows  of  witch-hazel,    with  arrows   of  reeds  ;  no  armor  which    Hariot   explored  was   on    the   boundary  of  the 

but  targets  of  bark  and  sticks  wickered  together  with  Algonquin  race,  where  the  Lenni  Lenape  tribes  melted 

thread.     The  walls  of  the  houses  were  made  of  bark,  into  the  widely-differing   nations   of    the  south.      The 

fastened  to  stakes  ;  and  sometimes  consisted  of  poles  wars   among   themselves  rarely  led  them  to  the  open 

fixed  upright,  one  by  another,  and  at  the  top  bent  over  battlefield  ;    they  were  accustomed  rather  to  sudden 

and  fastened,  as  arbors  are  sometimes  made  in  gardens,  surprises  at  daybreak   or   by  moonlight,  to  ambushes 

K  it  the  peculiarity  of  the  Indians  consisted  in  the  want  and  the  subtle  devices  of  cunning  falsehood.     Destitute 

o.  political  connection.     A  single  town  often  constituted  of  the  arts,  they  yet  displayed  excellency  of  wit  in  all 

a  government ,  a  collection  of  ten  or  twenty  wigwams  which  they  attempted. — Bancroft,  vol.  L  p.  98. 
was  au  ^dependent  State.     The  greatest  chief  in  the 


30   MISFORTUNES  OF   THE  COLONY.— SIR  FRANCIS  DRAKE. 

these  invisible  bullets  had  passed  through  their  vitals.  The  wise  men 
among  them  told  the  tribe  that  'more  Englishmen  were  yet  to  come  and  take 
their  places,  and  they  would  be  driven  from  their  homes  forever.'  The  in 
stinct  of  self-preservation  became  the  ruling,  but  concealed,  passion  of  the 
natives ;  and  they  deliberately  matured  a  plan  for  the  extermination  of  theii 
dreaded  enemies. 

March,  1586. — Taking  advantage  of  their  lust  for  gold,  one  savage,  more 
wily  than  the  rest,  invented  a  tale  of  a  far-off  river,  which  came  flowing  from 
the  shore  of  the  Pacific.  That  its  waters  rolled  over  golden  sand,  and  that 
the  walls  of  the  cities  of  its  people  glittered  in  pearls.  The  infatuated 
Governor,  abandoning  all  practical  work  of  establishing  his  colony,  ascended 
the  dashing  current  of  the  Roanoke,  on  his  tour  of  exploration,  so  far  that 
their  provisions  were  exhausted,  and  they  had  to  eat  their  own  dogs. 

Failing  in  their  first  device,  their  next  was,  to  leave  their  fields  unplanted 
that  their  enemies  might  be  starved  out.  These  and  other  hostile  signs  led 
the  English  to  believe  that  their  extermination  was  contemplated,  and,  meeting 
plot  by  plot,  the  poor  savage  was  to  be  outwitted  at  last. 

Wingina,  the  King,  having,  at  Lane's  request,  received  the  chief  men  of 
the  colony  to  an  audience,  under  professions  of  friendship,  the  Englishmen, 
at  a  given  signal,  sprang  upon  them  and  put  the  chief  and  all  his  attendants 
to  death  : — thus  interposing  another  barrier  to  the  peaceful  settlement  of 
these  fruitful  regions. 

As  the  colonists  had  not  gone  to  work  in  the  regular  business  of  establish 
ing  a  permanent  residence,  discontent  sprang  up ;  and,  disappointed  that  no 
supplies  were  sent  to  them  from  England,  they  were  on  the  last  verge  of  en- 
durance, when  an  unexpected  event  took  place. 

/ 

Sir  Francis  Drake. — The  heroic  daring  of  his  character,  and  the  gems  and 
gold  which  rewarded  his  adventures,  gave  a  lustre  to  the  name  of  Francis 
Drake,  which,  in  spite  of  a  career  of  piracy,  often  darkened  by  mercilest 
cruelty  to  the  helpless,  has  not  grown  dim  by  the  lapse  of  three  centuries 
In  returning,  by  way  of  the  West  Indies,  from  one  of  his  wild  expeditions, 
he  determined  to  visit  the  colony  of  his  friend  Sir  Walter  Raleigh.  The 
appearance  of  his  fleet  outside  of  Roanoke  Island  filled  the  colonists  with 
alternate  hope  and  apprehension.  A  glance  satisfied  him,  on  landing,  of  the 
condition  of  the  colony,  which  was  now  reduced  to  extremes,  and  he  mag- 
nanimously supplied  all  their  wants.  He  gave  to  the  Governor  a  perfectly 
equipped  bark  of  seventy  tons,  with  her  accompaniment  of  small  boats.  Two 
of  his  experienced  commanders  were  also  to  remain,  to  prosecute  Raleigh's 
original  plan  of  discovery.  And  well  it  was,  since  help  could  come  in  no 
other  way,  that  it  should  come  from  the  grandest  pirate  of  the  ocean;  still  better, 
that  this  prince  of  marauders  should  be  an  Englishman,  and  a  hearty  Briton 
at  that.1 

1  On  the  4th  of  April.  1581,  Queen  Elizabeth,  going    which  he  had  circumnavigated  the  globe.     After  dinner 
fc>  Deptford,  went  on  board  Captain  Drake's  ship  with     she  conferred  on  him  the  honor  of  knighthood  and  gave 


AN  AGRICULTURAL   STATE    TO   BE  FOUNDED.  3* 

But  all  this  generosity  was  of  little  avail.  In  a  gale,  unexpected  for  the 
season, — for  it  was  the  fore-part  of  June, — Drake  saved  his  fleet  only  b> 
standing  out  to  sea.  On  their  return,  nothing  was  found  of  the  bark  or  the 
boats  he  had  given  to  the  colonists,  and  with  one  voice  they  implored  th 
great  commander  to  take  them  back  to  England.  He  could  refuse  nothing 
to  countrymen  in  distress,  least  of  all  to  the  friends  of  the  gallant  Raleigh. 
He  took  them  all  aboard,  and  the  last  fires  of  their  New  World  roof-trees  went 
out  in  the  wilderness.  Thus  the  first  actual  settlement  of  Englishmen  in  North 
America  ceased  to  exist. 

1586. — Had  Governor  Lane  remained  a  little  longer,  the  legitimate  fruits 
of  these  long  efforts  at  colonization  might  have  been  saved  ;  for  a  supply-vessel 
for  their  relief  was  on  its  way  from  the  ever-thoughtful  and  generous  Raleigh. 
But  finding  the  settlement  deserted,  the  ship  returned  at  once  to  England. 
This  vessel,  too,  had  barely  got  out  of  sight  of  land,  before  a  well-provisioned 
squadron,  under  the  command  of  Sir  Richard  Grenville,  reached  the  coast. 
He  searched  in  vain  for  his  countrymen ;  but  determined  as  he  was  not  to 
abandon  the  rights  of  Raleigh,  or  the  Queen,  he  appointed  fifteen  picked  men 
to  remain  in  possession,  when  he  sailed  for  home. 

January  7,  1587. — Around  this  point  the  student  of  history  will  always 
linger.  The  fortunes  of  the  great  State,  afterwards  to  be  known  as  'the 
Mother  of  Presidents,'  now  hung  upon  the  steady  purpose  of  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh.  Undismayed  by.  previous  miscarriages ;  firm  in  his  conviction  that 
he  could  still  carry  out  his  great  purpose ;  clear  in  the  belief  that  the  success 
of  his  scheme  for  colonizing  America  would  plant  the  prosperity  of  England 
upon  an  immovable  basis  in  the  future,  he  soberly  surveyed  the  whole  field : 
and  bringing  to  his  aid  the  experience  already  learned  at  so  great  a  price,  he 
at  once  went  to  work  with  more  heroic  zeal  and  higher  intelligence  in  the 
fitting  out  of  another  fleet  with  which  he  resolved  to  move  to  Virginia  a  colony 
that  would  never  leave  its  shores.1 

An  Agricultural  State. — He  had  matured  his  views,  and  seen  the  mistakes 
made  in  his  former  attempts.  All  his  movements  were  now  directed  to  carrying 
out  the  plan  of  founding  an  agricultural  colony.  His  conduct  here  indicated 
one  of  the  greatest  qualities  statesmen  ever  display  :  a  comprehension  of  the 

directions  foi  the  preservation  of  his  ship,  that  it  might  the  discover}'  that  an  immense  revenue  could  only  be  ob- 

remain  a  monument  of  her  and  of  his  country's  glory,  tained  through  free-trade  ;  but  as  that  idea  was  not  likely 

When  the  vessel  was  going  to  decay,  it  was  broken  up,  to  meet  with  much  favor  from  the  Lord  Treasurer,  he 

and  a  chair  made  of  the  planks  was  presented  to  the  had  devised  other  plans  for  filling  the  national  coffers. 

University  of  Oxford,  where  it  is  still  preserved.  Spain,  he  knew,  imported  incalculable  treasures  from 

In  1662,  Cowley,  the  poet,  wrote  the  following  epi-  America,  where  gold,  it  was  believed,  sparkled  in  every 

gram,  addressed  to  the  chair  :  stream,    and   lay   in  inexhaustible   abundance    in    the 

To  this  great  Ship,  which  round  the  globe  has  run,  bowels   of  every   mountain.      Thitherward,    therefore, 

And  matched  in  race  the  chariot  of  the  sun,  would   the  enterprise  of  England   tend.     At  the  very 

This  Pythagorean  Ship  (for  it  may  claim,  moment  when  his  dalliance  with  the  Queen  maddened 

Without  presumption,  so  deserv'd  a  name),  Sir  Christopher  Hatton,   and  appeared   to  absorb  his 

By  knowledge  once,  and  transformation  now,  thoughts  and  exhaust  his  vigor,  his  imagination,  in  truth, 

In  her  new  shape  this  sacred  post  allow.  was  wafting  its  way  across  the  Atlantic,  and  planting 

Drake  and  his  ship  could  not  have  wished  from  fate  in  the  virgin  soil  of  North  America  the  germs  of  those 

An  happier  station,  or  more  blest  estate  ;  mighty  colonies  whose  power  and  grandeur  constitute 

For,  lo  !  a  seat  of  endless  rest  is  given  at  this  moment  the  astonishment,  if  not  the  terror  of  th« 

To  her  in  Oxford,  and  to  him  in  Heaven.  world.— St.  John's  Life  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  vul 

1   Raleigh's  vigorous  and  searching  mind  had  made  i.  p.  iio-n. 


32       RALEIGH  UNDAUNTED   ZOUNDS  ANOTHER    COLONY. 

law  by  which  society  has  to  be  constructed.  In  this  his  broad  common-sens  € 
stamped  him  as  the  first  civilian  of  his  age.  Recognizing  the  great  fact  tHat 
nothing  permanent  can  exist  in  the  form  of  civilized  society  except  by  begin- 
ning to  build  up  the  family  as  the  corner-stone,  he  chose  his  colonists  among 
married  men,  who  clearly  understood  that  they  were  going  to  Virginia  to  live, 
— that  their  homes  would  afterwards  be  beyond  the  Atlantic  :  that  there  they 
were  to  construct  their  own  dwellings,  till  their  own  soil,  protect  their  own 
rights :  that,  if  they  ever  again  saw  their  native  land,  it  would  be  after  they 
should  have  given  success  to  their  enterprise — neither  more  nor  less  than  that 
of  transplanting  the  tree  of  English  life  to  a  wilderness  soil.1 

Raleigh  was  the  prophet  of  the  future  ;  but  inspiring  a  sufficient  number 
of  men  with  some  little  portion  of  his  zeal  and  intelligence,  he  saw  his  squad- 
ron at  last  ready  to  sail. 

His  fleet  of  transports  had  been  got  ready  entirely  at  his  own  expense. 
Clothed  with  the  power  of  a  Viceroy  by  an  Act  of  Parliament,  and  enjoying 
the  prestige  of  the  favor,  if  not,  indeed,  the  passionate  love  and  caresses  of 
his  queen  ;  already  grown  rich  by  his  enterprise,  and  the  generous  partiality 
of  Elizabeth ;  mingling  with,  and  often  guiding  the  councils  of  the  kingdom ; 
restricted  by  no  instructions,  and  hampered  by  no  restraints,  he  had  a  fair 
opportunity  to  show  the  practical  wisdom  of  his  statesmanship.  He  granted 
to  the  colonists  a  charter  of  incorporation,  and  drew  up  a  plan  for  the  mu- 
nicipal government  of  the  '  City  of  Raleigh.'  He  appointed  John  White, 
Governor ;  and  to  him,  with  eleven  assistants  named  by  himself,  he  com- 
mitted the  administration  of  his  new  colony. 

April  26,  1587. — Thus  equipped  they  struck  out  into  the  Atlantic,  and  a 
favorable  passage  brought  them  direct  to  the  American  coast.  Their  anchors 
had  no  sooner  struck  the  soil,  than  a  party  landed  on  the  Island  of  Roanoke, 
expecting  to  be  greeted  by  the  little  company  of  fifteen  men  whom  Grenville 
had  left.  *  They  found  the  tenements  deserted  and  overgrown  with  weeds — 
human  bones  lay  scattered  on  the  field — wild  deer  were  reposing  in  the  un- 
tenanted houses,  and  were  feeding  on  the  productions  which  the  rank  vegeta- 
tion still  forced  from  the  gardens.  The  fort  was  in  ruins ;  no  vestige  of  sur- 
viving life  appeared  :  the  miserable  men  whom  Grenville  had  left  had  been 
murdered  by  the  Indians.' 

July  23. — If  the  instructions  of  Raleigh  had  been  followed,  the  city  which 
bears  his  name  would  have  been  founded  on  the  Bay  of  the  Chesapeake.     But 

1  Still  the  predominant  idea  in  Raleigh's  mind  wasi  of  opulence,  but  on  the  outlet  for  redundant  popula- 
that  of  founding  for  England  a  colonial  empire,  partly  tion,  on  the  expansions  and  improvement  of  industry, 
by  discovery  and  peopling  unknown  lands,  but  chiefly  on  the  advantages  to  be  derived  from  a  large  carrying 
oy  wresting  America,  North  and  South,  from  the  grasp  trade,  on  the  increase  of  political  power,  and  on  the 
of  Spain.  He  frequently  conversed  with  Sidney,  as  satisfaction  of  imparting  the  Christian  religion,  and  the 
well  as  many  others,  on  these  subjects,  but  his  highest  more  enlightened  morality  to  savage  men.  These  were 
ambition  was  to  inflame  Elizabeth's  imagination  by  the  the  topics  by  which  he  prevailed  upon  the  Queen,  as 
dazzling  prospect  of  extending  her  sceptre  over  America,  well  as  upon  Parliament,  to  favor  his  scheme  of  colon- 
Raleigh  left  out  of  sight  scarcely  any  consid-  ization,  which,  on  March  25,  1584,  was  shown  by  the 
tration  which  could  actuate  a  statesman  in  coveting  famous  patent  granted  him  to  search  out  and  take  pos- 
foreign  possessions.  In  his  addresses  and  memorials  session  of  new  lands  in  the  Western  Hemisphere. — St 
he  constantly  expatiates,  not  only  on  the  raw  materials  J(  hn's  Life  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  vol.  u  p.  123-3. 


FIRST  ENGLISH  CHILL   BORN  IN   VIRGINIA.  33 

the  naval  officer  of  the  expedition,  whose  eye  was  turned  towards  the  West 
indies,  with  a  view  to  gainful  traffic,  refused  to  co-operate  with  White.  By  a 
further  exploration  of  the  shores  to  the  north,  he  was  obliged  to  content  him- 
self with  commencing  his  operations  on  the  northern  part  of  the  island. 
There  were  still  'sundry  decent  dwelling-houses,'  with  the  fort  which  Governor 
Lane  had  built,  and  here  White  began  his  work. ' 

August  13,  1587. — Although  old  provocations  to  revenge  still  haunted  the 
minds  of  the  surrounding  Indians,  yet  the  mother  and  family  of  Manteo  gave 
a  warm  welcome  on  their  Island  of  Croatan  to  the  new  English  visitors ;  and 
on  the  13th  of  August,  at  the  command  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  that  faithful 
Indian  Chief  received  Christian  baptism,  and  was  made  a  feudal  Baron,  under 
the  title  of  Lord  of  Roanoke.  This  was  the  first  and  last  peerage  ever  created 
by  England  on  this  soil. 

Having  fulfilled  its  mission,  the  time  came  for  the  principal  vessel  to  re- 
turn to  England.  Governor  White  felt  bound  in  honoi  to  remain  and  carry 
out  the  designs  of  Raleigh ;  but  the  colonists,  men  and  women,  with  one 
voice,  implored  him  to  go  home,  and  lose  no  time  in  returning  with  supplies, 
to  secure  the  colony  against  the  hazards  of  want.  The  colonists  knew  they 
could  trust  White,  for  he  left  two  magnets  behind  him.  His  daughter, 
Eleonore  Dare,  who  had  married  one  of  his  assistants,  had  just  given  birth  to 
a  little  girl,  the  first  child  of  English  parents  born  on  the  soil  of  the  United 
States.  She  and  her  infant  were  among  the  colonists,  who  numbered  now 
eighty-nine  men,  seventeen  women,  and  two  children.  So,  kissing  his  little 
granddaughter,  and  naming  her  Virginia  Dare,  he  sailed  for  home,  and  for 
supplies,  which,  alas,  were  to  arrive  only  too  late. 

England  was  now  transported  with  apprehensions  at  the  invasion  of  her 
island  by  the  powerful  and  vindictive  Philip  II. ,  and  all  the  leading  spirits  of 
the  time  were  drawn  into  the  excitement.  Drake,  Hawkins,  Frobisher,  and 
all  the  great  adventurers  of  the  ocean,  were  preparing  for  sea.  Grenville, 
Lane,  and,  above  all,  Raleigh,  were  absorbed  in  Governmental  or  individual 
preparations  for  meeting  the  dreaded  power  of  the  Spanish  monarch.  All 
thought  of  the  little  Roanoke  colony  was  lost,  except  in  the  heart  of  Raleigh, 
who,  in  the  spring  of  the  next  year,  1588,  despatched  White  with  two  supply 
vessels.  But  they  were  diverted  by  the  glittering  prospect  of  prizes,  and  fall- 
ing in  with  parties  too  strong  for  them,  the  rifled  ships  were  barely  able  to 
escape  to  England.  Indignant  as  Raleigh  was  at  this  faithless  diversion  of 
his  supplies,  and  anxious  as  he  was  to  relieve  the  colony,  the  terror  of  the 
1  Invincible  Armada '  rendered  him  powerless  to  do  it,  and  the  further  history 
of  this  neglected  plantation  is  involved  in  the  gloom  of  uncertainty.  The  in 
habitants  of  the  '  City  of  Raleigh,'  the  emigrants  from  England,  and  the  first 

1  The  Island  of  Roanoke  is  now  almost  uninhabited  ;  of  the  associations  by  which  they  are  surrounded,  arv 

commerce  had  selected  securer  harbors  for  its  pursuits,  the   only    tenants  of    the    spot   where   the   inquisitiv*. 

The  intrepid  pilot  and   the  hardy  wrecker,   rendered  stranger  may  yet  discern  the  ruins  of  the  fort,  round 

adventurously  daring  by  their  familiarity  with  the  dan-  which  the  cottages  of  the  now  settlement  were  erected, 

gers  of  the  coast,  and    in    their  natures   wild  as  the  — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  p.  104. 
storms  to  which  their  skill  bids  defiance  ;    unconscious 


J4         PROTESTANTISM  AND   THE  INVINCIBLE  ARMADA. 

born  of  America,  failed,  like  their  predecessors,  in  establishing  an  enduring 
settlement.  But,  unlike  their  predecessors,  they  awaited  death  in  the  land  of 
their  adoption.    '  If  America  had  no  English  town,  it  soon  had  English  graves.' 

The  wrecks  of  the  Grand  Armada  were  strewn  along  the  shores  of  the 
Atlantic,  and  blackened  the  waters  of  the  German  Ocean.  The  valor  of 
England  and  the  favor  of  heaven  had  overwhelmed  the  mightiest  expedi- 
tion ever  launched  on  the  ocean,  and  Spain, — the  champion  of  the  Church 
of  the  Popes,  the  remorseless  foe  of  Protestantism, — never  recovered  from 
the  disaster.  From  this  point  history  marks  the  decline  of  her  power. 
Raleigh's  star,  which  had  blazed  so  bright,  was  soon  to  pass  into  its  deep 
eclipse,  and  he  could  no  longer  by  his  own  means  save  his  colony  from 
destruction. '  But,  to  the  last,  he  did  not  give  up  his  great  idea  of  colonization 
in  the  New  World.  He  made  an  arrangement  by  which  the  previous  grant  to 
White  and  his  associates  was  extended.  But  two  years  went  by  before  White 
could  return,  and  when  he  reached  the  Island  of  Roanoke  nothing  was  left 
to  tell  him  of  the  fate  of  his  colony,  but  an  inscription  on  the  bark  of  a  great 
tree,  with  a  finger  pointing  to  Croatan  ! 

The  season  of  the  year  was  unfavorable  to  the  search  ;  and  what  became  of 
the  colonists,  history  has  left  nothing  definite  enough  to  satisfy  the  millions  of 
the  curious  and  the  good,  who  for  three  centuries  have  expended  their  sympa- 
thies upon  the  luckless  and  abandoned  people. 

The  educated  men  of  Virginia,  and  the  scholars  of  Europe,  after  tireless 
researches,  have  at  last  been  obliged  to  be  satisfied  with  the  following  con- 
jecture, which,  at  least,  wears  the  color  of  reasonable  probability.  In  Manteo, 
'  the  Lord  of  Roanoke,'  and  Chief  of  Croatan,  the  English  colonists  had  a 
firm  and  loyal  friend.  Lawson's  '  South  Carolina1  sustains  the  conjecture 
that  he  came  to  the  rescue  of  the  colony,  and  hospitably  adopted  its  members 
into  the  tribe  of  the  Hatteras  Indians;  and  that  they  afterwards  became 
amalgamated  with  them.  A  tradition  to  that  effect  has  always  been  pre- 
served ;  and  many  shrewd  observers  have  adopted  the  belief  by  tracing  in  the 
physical  character  of  that  tribe  the  blended  characteristics  of  the  English  race. 

But  to  the  last,  even  during  his  long  imprisonment  in  the  Bloody  Tower, 
the  fortunes  of  his  Virginia  colony,  and  the  scheme  for  the  colonization  of 
Virginia,  were  never  given  up.  He  made  five  successive  attempts,  from  his 
impoverished  means,  to  send  relief.  But  while  he  was  dragging  out  the  long 
years  of  his  cruel  imprisonment  the  rivers  of  Virginia,  springing  from  the 
unwasting  fountains  of  her  own  mountain  ranges,  were  flowing  through  that 
vast  domain  of  virgin  soil.  '  That  Paradise  of  the  Continent '  was  yet  to 
wait  for  times  more  auspicious  before  a  colony  could  be  planted  that  would 
strike  its  roots  deep  enough  to  outlast  the  miscarriages  of  time. 

1  For  long  years  Raleigh  persisted   in  the  endea-  Raleigh  in  the  Edinburgh  Review,  No.  143,  to  sustain 

vor  to  achieve  with  the  fortune  of  the  subject  what  de-  his  assertion]  has  proved  all  those  accusations  to  be 

raanded  .the  revenues  of  an  emperor,  and  at  last,  in  groundless,  since,  from  the  beginning  of  h's  undertaking 

despair,  he  made  over  his  rights  to  a  joint-stock  com-  to  its  close,  Raleigh  exhausted  the  resources  both  of  his 

ipany.     Down  to  the  time  of  Southey  there  were  those  invention  and  of  his  purse,  to  promote  the  interests  and 

who  persevered  in  accusing  him  of  being  wanting  both  alleviate  the  misfortunes  of  those  who  had  confided  in 

in  liberality  and  humanity  towards  the  colonists  whom  him. — St.  John's  Life  0/  Sir  Walter  Raleigh.,  voL  i. 

he  induced  to  emigrate  to  the  New  World  ;  but  un-  p.  139-140. 
prejudicial  research  [St.  John  quotes  Napier's  article  on 


RALE  13 ITS  HEROIC  EFFORTS  FOR    COLONIZATION.        35 

With  a  few  words  from  the  inimitable  tribute  which  Bancroft  pays  to  the 
illustrious  prisoner  of  the  Tower,  we  reluctantly  take  leave  of  the  man  to 
whom  America  owes  so  lasting  a  debt  of  gratitude. 

Bancrofts  Tribute  to  Raleigh. — 'Raleigh  had  suffered  from  palsy  before 
his  last  expedition  [to  South  America].  He  returned  broken-hearted  by  the 
defeat  of  his  hopes,  by  the  decay  of  his  health,  and  by  the  death  of  his  eldest 
son.  What  shall  be  said  of  King  James,  who  would  open  to  an  aged  paraly- 
tic no  other  hope  of  liberty  but  through  success  in  the  discovery  of  mines  in 
Guiana  ?  What  shall  be  said  of  a  monarch  who  could,  at  that  time,  under  a 
sentence  which  was  originally  unjust,  and  which  had  slumbered  for  fifteen 
years,  order  the  execution  of  the  decrepit  man,  whose  genius  and  valor  shone 
brilliantly  through  the  ravages  of  physical  decay,  and  whose  English  heart 
within  the  palzied  frame,  still  beat  with  an  undying  love  for  his  country  ?' 

1  The  judgments  of  the  tribunals  of  the  Old  World  are  often  reversed  by 
public  opinion  in  the  New.  The  family  of  the  chief  author  of  early  coloni- 
zation in  the  United  States  was  reduced  to  beggary  by  the  government  of 
England,  and  he  himself  was  beheaded.  After  a  lapse  of  nearly  two  centu- 
ries, the  State  of  North  Carolina,  by  a  solemn  act  of  legislation,  revived  in 
its  capital  the  city  of  Raleigh  ;  thus  expressing  its  grateful  respect  for  the 
memory  of  the  extraordinary  man  who  united  in  himself  as  many  kinds  of  glory 
as  were  ever  combined  in  an  individual.' 

To  the  North. — Leaving  the  fair  shores  of  Virginia  for  a  little  while,  we 
come  north,  to  glance  at  other  discoveries  and  attempts  at  colonization  before 
the  permanent  establishment  of  the  Colony  of  Virginia,  or  the  landing  of  the 
Pilgrims.  The  ideas  of  Raleigh  were  not  to  die.  Every  one  of  them  was 
to  be  carried  out.  A  colony  as  grand  as  he  ever  contemplated  was  to  be 
established  on  the  banks  of  the  James  River ;  and  from  that  colony  was  to 
spring  a  Commonwealth  that  has  exceeded  in  glory  all  the  splendors  of  the 
imagination  of  its  foster-father. 

IS93~I6o2. — The  fisheries  of  Newfoundland  had  never  languished.  The 
European  path  to  them  had  been  ploughed  by  the  keels  of  hundreds  of  fish- 
ing vessels  every  year.  In  that  trade  was  raised  up  a  race  of  seafaring  men, 
who  were  afterwards  to  shed  glory  over  the  approaching  period  of  American 
colonization,  in  which  not  only  England,  but  France  and  Holland  were  to 
act  such  important  parts.  Even  here  we  trace,  in  these  northern  latitudes, 
the  beneficent  influence  of  Raleigh's  ideas  and  efforts. 

Bartholomew  Gosnold,  March  23,  1602. — Among  this  class  was  Bartholo- 
mew Gosnold.  This  brave  navigator  came  very  near  winning  for  New  Eng- 
land the  honor  of  holding  the  first  permanent  English  colony  on  these  shores. 
On  the  26th  of  March,  in  a  little  vessel,  he  began  his  voyage  in  a  direct  line 
across  the  Atlantic,  and  in  seven  weeks  he  struck  the  Island  of  Elizabeth,  on 


36  FOUNDATIONS  OF   THE  FIRST  NEW  ENGLAND   COLONY. 

the  coast  of  Maine.  On  the  14th  of  May  he  anchored  off  the  coast  to  th« 
south,  near  Savage  Rock,  east  of  York  Harbor;  but  not  liking  the  appear- 
ance of  the  shore,  he  sailed  on  one  day  longer,  when  he  discovered  the  pro- 
montory of  Cape  Cod.  He  went  ashore  with  a  few  of  his  men,  and  it  is 
believed  that  they  were  the  first  Englishmen  who  had  ever  stood  on  the  soil  of 
New  England.  Even  at  that  moment  not  one  single  European  family  was  liv- 
ing in  North  America,  from  frozen  Hudson's  Bay  to  the  blushing  savannahs 
of  Florida.  Bearing  to  the  south,  through  Buzzard's  Bay,  he  landed  on  a 
little  island  which  he  called  after  his  Queen,  and  which  was  to  give  its  name 
to  the  whole  Elizabeth  group  that  lay  to  the  eastward.  '  Here  they  beheld 
the  rank  vegetation  of  a  virgin  soil :  noble  forests,  wild  fruits  and  flowers 
bursting  from  the  earth ;  the  eglantine,  the  thorn,  and  the  honeysuckle ;  the 
wild  pea,  the  tansy,  the  young  sassafras;  strawberries,  raspberries,  grape- 
vines, all  in  profusion.  The  island  contains  a  pond,  within  which  lies  a 
rocky  islet ;  on  this  the  adventurers  built  their  storehouse  and  their  fort : 
and  the  foundations  of  the  first  New  England  colony  were  laid.  The  island, 
the  pond,  the  islet,  are  yet  visible ;  the  shrubs  are  luxuriant,  as  of  old ;  but 
the  forests  are  gone,  and  the  ruins  of  the  fort  can  no  longer  be  discerned. 

\  The  whole  party  soon  set  sail  and  bore  for  England.  The  return  voyage 
lasted  but  five  weeks,  and  the  expedition  was  completed  in  less  than  four 
months,  during  which  entire  health  had  prevailed.'  ■ 

The  Co?icord. — Gosnold's  little  ship,  Concord,  was  laden  with  sassafras, 
which  the  friendly  Indians  had  assisted  him  in  gathering,  and  which  enjoyed 
at  that  time  a  reputation  in  the  pharmacy  of  Europe  similar  to  the  Peruvian 
bark,  afterwards  discovered  by  the  Jesuits  in  South  America.  He  intended 
to  leave  some  of  his  party  there  ;  but  the  shadows  of  an  uncertain  future 
gathered  too  thickly  over  the  fancies  of  the  little  group.  Between  fear  of 
the  Indians  and  destitution,  they  all  insisted  upon  returning ;  and  on  the  18th 
of  June,  when  everything  was  beautiful  around  them,  and,  as  far  as  we  know, 
they  might  have  established  a  permanent  colony,  they  lifted  anchor  for  home, 
having  completed  the  excursion  in  the  short  period  of  four  months,  which  it 
seems  to  us  must  have  been  but  a  pleasure  trip,  since  every  soul  returned  in 
perfect  health. 

Richard  Hakluyt. — Next  to  Raleigh  no  man  of  the  time  held  such  en- 
lightened views  about  commercial  enterprises,  or  wrote  their  history  so  min- 
utely or  so  well  as  Richard  Hakluyt.  His  name  never  will  be  mentioned 
without  inspiring,  at  least  in  the  minds  of  American  historians,  the  warmest 
admiration. 

Martin  Fring,  April  10,  1603. — Still  in  confidential  intercourse  with 
Raleigh,  and  acting  under  his  advice,  the  merchants  of  Bristol  entertained 
tfce  idea  of  returning  to  the  region  Gosnold  had  left.     The  death  of  the 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  i.  p.  na-13. 


SHAKESPEARE'S  PROPHECY  OF  AMERICA.  37 

Queen  did  not  arrest  their  undertaking ;  and  a  few  days  after  that  important 
event,  Martin  Pring,  in  command  of  the  Speedwell,  of  fifty  tons,  and  the 
Discoverer,  of  twenty-six,  carrying  forty-three  men  all  told,  sailed  on  this 
private  expedition.  Their  chief  object  being  traffic  with  the  natives,  they 
supplied  themselves  with  an  abundance  of  trinkets,  and  steered  for  the  coast 
of  Maine.  Pring  had  what  he  called,  and  what  we  can  readily  believe,  an 
exciting  and  successful  summer  voyage.  He  discovered  most  of  the  harbors 
of  Maine,  which  he  named  and  described ;  went  up  the  Saco,  Kennebunk 
and  York  rivers,  and  ascended  the  Piscataqua  for  ten  or  fifteen  miles.  The 
region,  however,  was  destitute  of  sassafras,  and  doubling  Cape  Ann  he 
landed  on  the  shore  of  Massachusetts.  Finding  no  sassafras,  he  looked  into 
the  harbor  of  Old  Town  on  Martha's  Vineyard,  where  the  sassafras  abounded, 
and  laid  at  anchor  till  his  vessel  was  loaded.  It  proved  a  profitable  venture 
on  his  return  to  England,  after  an  absence  of  only  six  months- 

Shakespeare  and  his  Friends,  1605. — Most  of  the  annalists  of  these  times 
seem  to  have  indulged  in  the  pleasures  of  speculation  when  they  reached  the 
end  of  the  thread  of  their  authentic  narrative.  We  do  not  know  why  we  may 
not  have  the  same  privilege  ;  nor  need  we  draw  very  largely  on  the 
imagination  in  supposing  that,  during  a  pleasant  evening  over  their  sack  at 
Boar's  Head  Tavern,  Shakespeare,  then  about  retiring  from  the  stage,  should, 
with  his  chief  patron  the  Earl  of  Southampton,  Bacon,  and  other  kindred 
spirits,  in  view  of  Hakluyt's  proposed  expedition,  have  uttered  his  splendid 
prophecy,  which  promised  to  England  the  possession  of  a  hemisphere  through 
the  patronage  of  King  James,  who  had  then  just  ascended  the  throne. 

•  Wherever  the  bright  sun  of  Heaven  shall  shine, 
His  honor  and  the  greatness  of  his  name 
Shalt  be,  and  make  new  nations.     He  shall  flourish, 
And  like  a  mountain  cedar,  reach  his  branches 
To  all  the  plains  about  him.' 

Certain  it  is  that  the  words,  if  not  the  imagined  scene,  bring  that  divinest 
of  all  the  poets  nearer  the  American  shores ;  where  his  name  was  in  coming 
ages  to  be  mentioned  a  thousand  times,  and  his  plays  a  thousand  times 
be  heard  by  American  ears,  where  they  were  once  to  be  in  his  native  land — 
where,  instead  of  the  narrow  precincts  of  a  little  island,  holding  at  best  but  a 
handful  of  people,  he  was  to  have  a  whole  continent  for  a  theatre,  and  audi- 
tors whom  no  man  could  number.  We  do,  however,  certainly  know  that  the 
Earl  of  Southampton,  in  conference  with  Hakluyt  and  the  Bristol  merchants, 
confided  the  new  expedition  which  had  been  got  ready,  to  the  command  of 
George  Waymouth,  an  experienced  navigator,  who  had  already  coasted  the 
southeastern  snores  of  America. 

Easter  Sunday,  1605. — On  this  auspicious  morning  Waymouth  weighed 
anchor,  and  a  short  passage  brought  him  in  sight  of  the  sands  of  Cape  Cod. 
But  escaping  its  long  and  treacherous  shore,  he  sailed  northward,  threading 
his  way  among  the  St.  George's   Islands,  where   he  found  a  safe  harbor  with 


38  WAYMOUTH  EXPLORES  THE   COAST  OF  MAINE. 

a  fine  anchorage,  under  the  shelter  of  protecting  cliffs.  It  was  the  latter  part 
of  May,  and  the  climate  was  delightful.  The  sea  was  alive  with  the  finest  fish, 
and  the  islands  overshadowed  with  waving  forests  of  gigantic  growth.  They 
drove  successful  traffic  with  the  native  Indians,  obtaining  for  their  trinkets 
sables,  otter,  and  deer  skins.  They  were  almost  tempted  to  settle.  But  Way- 
mouth  was  for  further  exploration,  and  he  tells  us  that  he  ascended  the  river 
— St.  George — '  six  and  twenty  miles,  as  he  reckoned,  where  all  consented  in 
joy  to  admire  its  width  of  a  half  mile,  or  a  mile  ;  its  verdant  banks ;  its  gal- 
lant and  spacious  cones,  and  the  strength  of  its  tide,'  which  he  estimates  as 
high  as  eighteen  or  twenty  feet.  Still  further  up  the  stream  he  planted  a 
memorial  cross,  where  he  says  he  found  no  trace  that  a  Christian  had  ever  been 
there.  Satisfied  with  the  success  of  his  venture,  he  managed  to  get  five  of 
the  native  Indians  on  board,  whom  he  was  '  to  instruct  in  English,  and  use  as 
guides  on  some  later  expedition.' 

Such  is  a  hurried  view  of  the  discoveries  which  were  made  in  North 
America,  and  the  attempts  at  colonization  during  the  first  century  which  fol- 
lowed the  death  of  Columbus.  Although  this  period  is  distinguished  by  no 
events  of  astounding  magnitude,  yet  the  occurrences  we  have  related  were  to 
color  all  the  future,  and  assume  vast  importance  in  connection  with  other 
events  that  were  shortly  to  transpire. 

The  mind  of  Europe  had  become  familiar  with  the  idea  of  a  western  con- 
tinent standing  in  the  ocean  by  itself,  midway  between  Europe  and  Asia. 
Immense  progress  had  been  made  in  the  art  of  navigation,  and  in  the  construc- 
tion and  equipment  of  vessels  and  expeditions  for  distant  voyages.  A  knowledge 
of  the  shores  of  America,  the  nature  of  its  soil,  the  character  of  its  inhabitants, 
the  salubrity  of  its  climate,  and  the  inexhaustible  wealth  of  its  fisheries,  had 
become  known,  and  the  result  was  to  direct  the  attention  of  the  Old  World  to 
the  New ;  while  gradually  the  idea  of  its  permanent  colonization  had  begun  to 
take  possession  of  the  popular  mind  of  England,  and  gain  some  place  in 
the  consideration  of  her  statesmen. 

The  fiercest  scenes  were  over  in  the  conflict  between  the  ancient  church 
and  what  was  to  become  the  new  religion — a  religion  which  was  to  pass 
through  all  forms  of  Protestantism  before  the  world  could  receive  a  spiritual 
Christianity,  which  is  to  be  the  future  faith  of  all  mankind.  These  scenes  of 
ferocity  and  bloodshed  were  never,  we  hope,  to  be  renewed.  The  great 
struggle,  however,  between  liberty  of  thought  and  restraint  on  conscience, 
was  by  no  means  intermitted.  That  struggle,  so  far  from  being  over  even  in 
our  time,  has  but  just  begun.  Its  heaviest  work,  indeed,  may  have  been 
achieved  ;  for  Feudalism,  with  its  long  train  of  self-arrogated  rights  of  oppres- 
sion, so  slow  in  going  down,  has  disappeared  at  last,  and  slavery  is  hastening 
to  the  same  doom.  Among  civilized  nations,  the  sacredness  of  human  rights 
is  no  longer  successfully  disputed,  and  even  barbarous  nations  are  no  more 
to  outrage  the  code  of  humanity  with  impunity. 

In  no  European  country  were  circumstances  so  favorable  for  American 
colonization,  as  in  England.     The  miscarriage  of  so  many  expeditions  had 


CAPTAIN  JOHN  SMITH.  39 

not  repressed  the  ardor  of  Raleigh,  and  in  the  midst  of  his  sublime  studies  in 
the  Bloody  Tower,  the  pursuits  of  the  scholar  did  not  dampen  the  ardor  of  the 
patriot  statesman.  His  country  was  yet  to  reap  the  reward  of  all  his  efforts 
to  establish  her  dominion  in  the  Western  wilderness  ;  and  when  at  last  he  was 
carried  out  to  an  ignominious  death,  one  of  the  chief  thoughts  that  sustained 
his  lion  spirit,  was  that  he  had  lived  to  see,  in  the  permanent  establishment 
of  the  colony  of  Virginia,  the  realization  of  hopes  he  had  so  long  cherished. 

England  was  better  prepared  to  become  the  file-leader  of  civilization  than 
any  other  nation.  It  was  there  that  the  frenzied  passion  for  gold  first  gave 
way  to  the  dignity  of  honest  labor  and  higher  enterprises.  It  was  there  that 
piracy  was  first  proclaimed  outlawry  on  the  sea, — a  crime  without  pardon  ; 
that  commerce  was  elevated  to  a  high  standard  of  intercourse  between  na- 
tions j  that  constitutional  liberty  and  personal  freedom,  which  were  to  go 
side  by  side  with  the  Protestant  religion,  were  first  established,  and  the  sacred- 
ness  of  humanity  began  to  be  vindicated. 

Captain  John  Smith. — Next  to  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  Virginia  was  to  be  more 
indebted  to  Captain  John  Smith  than  to  any  other  man  in  her  early  history ; 
and  among  all  the  names  that  are  left  on  her  scroll  of  heroic  achievement,  his 
will  forever  stand  among  the  brightest.  His  broad  common-sense  rose  above 
mere  cool  reason  ;  it  reached  the  sphere  of  illuminated  sagacity.  The  clear- 
ness of  his  perception ;  the  infallible  intuition  by  which  he  saw  at  a  glance 
all  things  that  were  hidden  from  common  eyes  ;  his  prophetic  forecast  which 
shed  light  over  the  future  ;  the  exhaustless  resources  of  his  genius ;  the  un 
wavering  steadiness  of  his  purpose  ;  the  chivalry  of  his  honor  j  the  sublimity 
of  his  courage ;  the  loftiness  of  his  magnanimity ;  his  unwasting  enthusiasm 
for  humanity  j  the  rapidity  of  his  execution — all  combined  to  complete  one 
of  the  fairest  and  noblest  characters  that  have  ever  adorned  the  annals  of  the 
human  race.  He  was  one  of  those  men  that  God  raises  up  for  great  exigen- 
cies— men  who  never  disappoint  the  expectations  of  the  world.  When  all 
others  quail,  they  remain  undaunted  ;  when  others  waver,  they  stand  unmoved. 
Upon  their  strong  arms  hang  the  hopes  of  their  times  ;  to  their  guidance  is 
committed  the  bark  which  carries  the  treasured  hopes  of  whole  generations. 

Preparations  for  the  Permanent  Colonization  of  Virginia. — Gosnold  had 
been  slowly  maturing  a  wiser  expedition  than  any  which  had  preceded  it.  He 
was  one  of  those  few  men  who  are  endowed  with  that  very  rare  gift  of  learn- 
ing by  experience  ;  for  the  power  to  retrieve,  the  capacity  to  learn  from  one's 
own  experience,  and  profit  by  the  mistakes  of  others,  is  a  most  precious  gift. 
He  could  speak  of  trans-Atlantic  matters  from  his  own  knowledge,  and  he 
had  the  power  to  persuade  others.  He  knew  how  to  choose  his  assistants,  as 
was  fully  shown  in  the  sagacity  he  displayed.  He  clustered  around  him  a 
group  of  men,  very  diverse  in  character,  but  each  endowed  with  a  special 
quality  adapted  to  the  part  he  was  to  perform.  In  Wingfield,  an  adventurous 
merchant,  of  the  west  of  England,  he  found  money,  and  a  spirit  of  gain  that 
knew  when  to  play  hazards.      In  Robert  Hunt,  a  clergyman  of  honest  ie- 


4o  GORGES,  POPHAM,  HAKLUYT,    JAMES  J. 

ligious  convictions,  winning  manners,  ripe  learning,  and  firmness  of  charac- 
ter. In  Smith,  everything  that  was  required  to  crystallize  his  plan.  This  wag 
the  magnetic  centre  which  was  to  attract  the  loose  elements  scattered  through 
England,  and,  by  the  law  of  affinity,  blend  them  together. 

Gorges,  Popham,  Hakluyt,  and  James  I.,  1606. — We  have  here  placed  the 
British  sovereign  last,  because  he  was  the  least.  And  yet,  in  all  charity,  we 
may  thank  that  pompous  and  silly  king,  since  the  vanity,  which  was  his  ruling 
passion,  of  connecting  his  name  with  an  enterprise  that  might  turn  out  so 
well,  induced  him  to  extend  all  the  favor  that  was  necessary  to  this  last  move- 
ment which  was  to  assume  so  shortly  such  large  proportions.  We  must  look 
into  this  Council,  which  carried  on  its  deliberations  sometimes  in  the  palace 
and  sometimes  in  the  tavern.  The  king  was  easily  flattered.  Gorges  was 
needed  for  his  rank,  his  wealth,  and  his  influence ;  and  the  sanction  of  the 
Lord-  Chief-Justice  of  England,  Sir  John  Popham,  it  was  almost  imperative  to 
win.  But  the  greatest  of  all  these  councillors  was  Richard  Hakluyt,  the 
ablest  and  most  reliable  historian  of  the  maritime  enterprises  of  his  times. 
He,  better  than  all  other  men,  represented  the  views  of  Raleigh,  and  shared 
more  fully  in  his  noble  spirit.  He  also  more  thoroughly  understood  the  his- 
tory of  all  preceding  expeditions.  He,  moreover,  represented  the  interests  of 
Raleigh's  assigns,  who  had  never  abandoned  the  idea  of  carrying  out  his  plan. 
Bancroft,  with  his  usual  felicity,  thus  sums  up  the  elements  on  which  the  new 
expedition  depended  :  '  When  therefore,  a  company  of  men  of  business,  and 
men  of  rank,  formed  by  the  experience  of  Gosnold,  the  enthusiasm  of  Smith, 
the  perseverance  of  Hakluyt,  the  hopes  of  profit,  and  the  extensive  influence 
of  Popham  and  Gorges,  applied  to  James  I.  for  leave  "  to  deduce  a  colony 
into  Virginia,"  the  monarch  promoted  the  noble  work  by  readily  issuing  an 
ample  patent.' 

The  First  Great  Colonial  Charter, — We  must  look  at  this  carefully,  for 
out  of  it  grew  the  elements  of  our  national  life.  It  determined  as  much  the 
fortunes  of  New  England  as  it  did  of  the  great  State  of  Virginia,  and  the  com- 
monwealths that  were  soon  clustered  around  her.  They  gave  to  Virginia  the 
precedence  she  has  till  this  day  held,  and  which  she  so  honorably  won,  as  the 
pioneer  and  leader  of  the  South — as  Plymouth  colony  was  soon  to  be  sur- 
rounded by  the  other  commonwealths  of  New  England,  which  was  to  become 
the  source  of  light  and  the  fountain  of  power  for  swaying  the  whole  continent. 

The  title  of  England  to  the  territory  stretching  from  Cape  Fear  to  Hali* 
fax  was  undisputed.1  This  embraced  a  belt  of  twelve  degrees  of  latitude  on 
the  Atlantic  coast,  and  it  was  to  be  settled  by  two  Companies,  who,  in  friendly 
rivalsr  ip,  were  to  divide  a  common  work ;  the  limits  to  each  clearly  defined. 

The  London  Company. — This  Company  had  its  headquarters  in  London, 

1  Except  to  the  bright  little  spot  in  Acadia,  where  the    soon  to  be  blotted  out  by  the  brutality  of  ArgaU. 
French  had  established  a  settlement,  and  which  was 


THE  LONDON  AND  PLYMOUTH   COMPANIES.  4* 

and  was  composed  of  men  of  rank,  and  merchants  of  wealth  and  enterprise 
They  had  the  exclusive  right  to  occupy  the  soil  from  the  34th  to  the  39th 
degree,  which,  beginning  at  Cape  Fear  extended  to  the  southern  line  of 
Maryland,  the  Atlantic  being. .the  eastern  boundary.  No  limits  were  assigned 
to  the  west,  for  it  was  an  unknown  wilderness. 

The  Plymouth  Company. — It  was  composed  of  the  same  corresponding 
classes  in  the  west  of  England — knights,  gentlemen,  and  merchants.  Its 
exclusive  right  to  establish  plantations,  was  limited  to  the  41st  and  45th  de- 
grees;  while,  between  the  two  Companies,  from  the  38th  to  the  41st,  lay  a 
region  from  which  both  were  forever  excluded.  This  was  deemed  a  wise 
provision  against  infringement  by  either.  Although  the  London  Company 
alone  succeeded,  yet  most  important  results  followed  the  granting  of  the  two 
charters,  and  especially  the  reservation  of  the  tract  of  one  hundred  miles  be- 
tween them. 

The  Nature  of  the  Grant. — The  colonists  were  to  remain  Englishmen, 
parting  with  none  of  their  rights,  but  bound  by  all  the  claims  of  homage  due  to 
their  king.  The  further  condition  was  the  payment  to  the  crown  of  one-fifth 
of  the  net  proceeds  of  the  gold  and  silver,  and  one-fifteenth  of  all  the  copper 
mined  or  coined — the  right  of  coining,  for  the  purpose  of  facilitating  com- 
merce with  the  natives,  being  granted  in  the  charter.  The  duties  on  tonnage 
were  to  be  devoted  for  twenty-one  years  solely  to  the  benefit  of  the  colony. 
A  colonial  council  was  established  in  England,  appointed  and  presided  over 
by  the  king.  English  laws  were  to  regulate  the  tenure  of  the  soil.  All  that 
the  colonies  received,  in  fact,  by  this  first-written  American  charter  for  per- 
manent colonization,  was  a  wilderness  territory,  which  they  were  to  people 
and  defend.  Emigrants  were  not  guaranteed  the  elective  franchise,  nor  a 
single  right  of  self-government.  They  were  entirely  subject  to  the  council 
in  Virginia,  which,  in  turn,  was  subject  to  the  supreme  council  in  England, 
and  that  was  subject  to  the  will  of  the  sovereign.  Although  the  arbitrary 
character  of  this  charter  precluded  all  idea  of  independent  colonial  govern- 
ment, yet  it  worked  very  well  for  the  time,  since  the  domestic  council  had 
no  power  to  tyrannize  over  the  members  of  the  colony ;  and  in  after  times 
the  people  of  Virginia  were  to  take  care  of  themselves.  The  great  thing  was, 
to  make  a  start ;  and  this  was  done.  Wherever  Englishmen  went,  they'bore 
with  them  the  palladium  of  the  common  law,  and  the  grandest  provision  of 
the  old  Magna  Charta,  trial  by  jury.  These  two  colossal  principles  of 
civilization  were  enough  to  determine  the  symmetry  and  strength  of  any 
ruture  structure  that  was  to  be  reared  on  such  immovable  foundations. 

Sailing  of  the  Expedition,  Dee.  19,  1606. — The  squadron  consisted  of  three 
vessels,  the  largest  being  less  than  one  hundred  tons,  and  carrying  one  hundred 
and  five  men  to  establish  the  colony.  Strange  enough,  too,  were  the  mate- 
rials chosen :  a  dozen  common  laborers,  half  as  many  mechanics,  perhaps, 
four  carpenters,  and  forty-eight  gentlemen — who  were  no  more  qualified  to 


ft  THE   COLONY  OF   JAMESTOWN  FOUNDED. 

get  a  living  in  the  woods  than  as  many  young  lady  graduates  of  our  fashionable 
schools  are  to  go  out  to  day's  washing.  As  for  houses — of  which  there  was  not 
one  standing  in  Virginia — none  of  the  four  carpenters  had  ever  seen  a  saw- 
mill for  getting  out  lumber,  since  England  herself  was  not  to  be  in  the  pos- 
session of  such  a  thing  for  a  hundred  and  sixty  years.1 

Newport,  the  commander,  had  crossed  the  Atlantic  ;  but,  knowing  only  the 
southern  route,  he  wasted  the  whole  winter  in  the  long  passage  by  the  Cana- 
ries and  West  Indies.  They  soon  found  themselves  at  sea,  in  more  senses 
than  one.  King  James,  who  was  at  best  little  more  than  a  royal  hen-hussy, 
had  carefully  concealed  the  names  of  the  Virginia  council,  with  their  instruc- 
tions, in  a  tight  box,  which  was  to  remain  unopened  till  the  colony  reached 
its  destination.  There  was  no  authority  to  restrain  discontent,  nor  repress 
disorder,  except  such  as  belonged  of  necessity  to  Newport,  who  seems  to 
have  been  incompetent  to  exert  it.  It  early  became  evident,  however,  that 
Smith  was  the  master-spirit  of  the  whole  company,  which  gave  rise  to  the 
envy  and  malice  that  afterwards  brought  so  much  trouble  on  them  all. 

In  making  the  northern  passage  from  the  West  Indies  a  gale  swept  them 
beyond  Raleigh,  for  which  they  had  sailed ;  and  passing  the  two  headlands  of 
the  Chesapeake,  which  they  named  Capes  Henry  and  Charles  after  the 
King's  sons,  they  came  to  safe  anchorage  at  Northern  Point,  which,  Captain 
Smith  tells  us,  *  found  the  ready  name  of  Comfort,'  which  indicated  the  feel- 
ings of  relief  the  emigrants  experienced  after  all  the  apprehensions  and 
dangers  of  the  voyage.  The  whole  region  was  clothed  in  the  beauty  of  early 
spring,  and  in  describing  it,  Smith  says  that  '  heaven  and  earth  seemed  never 
to  have  agreed  better  to  frame  a  place  for  man's  commodious  and  delightful 
habitation.' 

After  getting  things  ready,  they  sailed  up  the  mouth  of  the  magnificent 
stream  which  they  named  after  their  king,  till  they  reached  a  peninsula  which 
they  called  Jamestown,  fifty  miles  from  the  mouth ;  and  this  was  by  common 
consent  chosen  as  the  site  of  their  colony. 

Lacking  as  they  were  in  some  of  the  elements  necessary  to  the  founding 
of  a  prosperous  colony  ;  embarrassed  by  a  superabundance  of  gentlemen, 
and  a  lack  of  common  workmen  and  artisans  for  construction  ;  and,  above  all, 
destitute  of  women,  they  might  still  have  been  successful  had  not  other  trou- 
bles arisen  of  their  own  making.  When  their  instructions  were  opened,  they 
chose  Wingfield  president  of  the  council ;  and  bringing  a  charge'of  sedition 
against  Smith  they  excluded  him  from  any  share  in  their  councils.  But  Stith 
tells  us  that  no  serious  attempt  was  made  to  sustain  the  charge,  and  through 
the  good  doctrine  and  exhortation  of  Mr.  Hunt,  without  whose  aid  the  vices 
of  the  colony  would  have  caused  its  immediate  ruin,  Captain  Smith  was  soon 

1  The  first  saw-mill  built  in  England  was  set  up  at  tion  at  the  falls  of  the  Piscataqua  :  and  this  was  only 

Limehouse  in   1768  :   but  it  was  regarded  either  as  an  fourteen  years  after  the  Pilgrims  landed  on  Plymouth 

enemy  to  the  workingman,  or  else  as  a  contrivance  of  Rock.     Having  lived  in  Holland,  where  saw-mills  wera 

the   Devil,    and   a  mob   destroyed  it.     It  may  seem  in  operation  so  long  before  England  had  one,  the  Pil- 

strange,  but  more  than  one  hundred  and  thirty  years  grims  lost  no  time  in  introducing  this  grand  invention 

before  England  had  a  saw-mill,  one  was  in  full  opera-  into  their  setdements. 


DEATH  OF   GOSNOLD— SMITH'S  HEROIC  CONDUCT.         43 

restored  to  his  station,  while  it  soon  became  evident  enough  that  if  any  thing 
effectual  was  to  be  done  it  would  be  accomplished  by  his  energy  and  control. 
After  consultation  with  the  commander,  he  started  up  the  river  with  twenty 
men,  and  reaching  the  falls  just  below  Richmond,  went  to  pay  a  visit  to  'the 
Emperor  of  the  country.'  Their  predecessors  had  left  none  too  favorable  an 
impression  on  the  minds  of  the  great  Powhatan's  subjects.  But  this  really 
superior  man,  who  held  undisputed  sway  over  his  rude  subjects,  allayed  their 
discontent  by  telling  them  '  they  will  not  hurt  you :  they  take  but  a  little 
waste  land.'  This  all  did  very  well  for  a  while  ;  but  unmistakable  signs  of 
hostility  on  the  part  of  the  natives  became  evident,  and  soon  after  Newport 
had  sailed  for  England, — the  middle  of  June, — the  clouds  began  to  gather  ovei 
the  young  colony.  Only  a  few  men  knew  how  to  fell  the  trees,  or  clear  oj 
plant  the  soil.  The  heat  became  intense,  and  melted  them  down.  The  pro- 
visions brought  with  them  had  been  spoiled  on  the  voyage.  •  Our  drink, 
says  the  account,  '  was  unwholesome  water ;  our  lodgings,  castles  in  the  air  : 
had  we  been  as  free  from  all  sins  as  from  gluttony  and  drunkenness,  we 
might  have  been  canonized  for  saints.'  Only  a  few  days  after  Newport's 
departure,  the  emigrants  were  so  stricken  down  that  'hardly  ten  of  them 
were  able  to  stand.'  The  exhaustion  of  building  their  fort  left  them  without 
five  able  men  to  guard  the  bulwarks  ;  and  the  relation  is  filled  with  dis- 
heartening descriptions  of  the  groans  of  the  sick  and  the  dying.  The  ravages 
of  disease  were  so  great  that  'the  dead  bodies  were  dragged  out  of  the 
cabins  like  dogs  to  be  buried.'  Before  the  forest  leaves  began  to  turn 
in  the  autumn,  one-half  of  the  colonists  had  perished.  Even  the  resolute 
and  noble  Bartholomew  Gosnold  had  to  succumb;  and  with  the  sadness  of 
utter  desolation,  his  companions  laid  him  in  his  grave,  on  a  rise  of  ground 
overlooking  the  river. 

As  if  the  prospects  of  the  colony  were  not  gloomy  enough,  the  bitterest 
passions  of  malice  and  selfishness  came  in  to  complete  the  disaster.  Wing- 
field  had  appropriated  to  his  own  use  the  best  of  the  provisions,  and  was 
suspected  of  a  design  to  escape  to  the  West  Indies.  He  was  deposed,  and 
Ratcliffe,  an  equally  incompetent  man,  chosen  as  his  successor.  But  at  this 
moment  of  helplessness  and  gloom,  when  all  other  reliances  gave  way,  Smith 
took  the  command.  With  a  training  which  no  other  man  of  his  time,  or  per- 
haps of  any  other,  ever  had,  he  brought  to  the  crisis  the  indomitable  energies 
of  his  wonderful  character.  He  had  not  yet  reached  thirty  years  of  age, 
although  he  had  lived  the  lives  of  a  hundred  men.  He  alone  could  save  the 
disheartened  colony.  Inured  by  exposure  to  every  hardship  and  danger  in 
every  clime,  he  went  through  enormous  labors.  He  alleviated  the  sufferings 
of  the  sick  ;  he  breathed  hope  into  the  ears  of  the  dying ;  he  dug  graves  for 
the  dead,  and  sustained  the  feeble  and  broken-hearted  by  his  own  cheerful- 
ness. He  foiled  the  selfish  schemes  of  Wingfield,  and  the  feeble  treachery 
of  Ratcliffe,  by  a  sternness  of  conduct  which  cost  one  of  the  leaders  his  life, 
and  inspired  the  rest  with  salutary  awe.  But  even  he  would  have  found  the 
work  impossible,  had  not  the  close  of  the  season  for  navigation  been  brought 


44  SMITH  MADE  PRISONER  BY  THE  INDIANS. 

on  by  the  early  inclemency  of  the  weather,  and  the  wild  fowl  and  game  been 
so  abundant  that  there  was  no  fear  of  famine. 

Smith  Explores  the  Country. — 1607-8. — Having  reduced  the  remains  of 
the  colony  to  submission  and  order,  he  could  for  the  first  time  turn  his 
attention  to  one  of  the  instructions  of  the  home  Council,  which  was  to 
discover  some  stream  by  ascending  whose  current  he  might  form  a  connec- 
tion with  the  great  ocean — the  South  Sea — which  was  supposed  to  lead  to 
illimitable  wealth.  Smith  was  too  well  informed  to  place  any  reliance  on 
such  vague  notions ;  but  in  the  spirit  of  disciplined  obedience,  he  attempted 
to  carry  out  his  instructions.  The  deep  and  sluggish  Chickahominy  was 
ascended  as  far  as  his  boats  could  go,  when  he  took  to  the  woods  with  his  com- 
pass, to  continue  his  explorations. 

The  folly  and  disobedience  of  his  men  betrayed  them  into  an  ambush 
which  cost  them  their  lives.  Unable  to  strike  any  terror  into  the  soul  of 
Smith,  and  over-awed  by  his  firmness  and  self-possession,  the  savages  were 
content  to  hold  him  as  a  prisoner.  But  his  former  experience  with  tribes 
quite  as  savage,  stood  him  in  good  stead.1  He  showed  them  his  pocket 
compass,  which  they — poor  souls — understood  just  as  well  as  we  do  to  this 
day.  It  was  enough  for  his  purposes  and  theirs,  as  it  is  for  ours,  that  it 
always  pointed  in  the  same  direction.  Worship  and  fear  are  akin  to  mystery  : 
they  looked  upon  him  with  reverence.  He  wrote  a  letter,  which  they  consented 
to  send  to  Jamestown  ;  for  they  did  not  dare  to  retain  long  in  their  possession 
so  mysterious  a  thing.  If  the  civilized  mind  sometimes  cannot  resist  the 
superstition  engendered  by  mystery,  why  should  we  wonder  at  the  spell  which 
held  these  simple  savages  ?  He  showed  and  did  other  things  which  still 
more  excited  their  wonder  and  dread.  The  news  of  this  strange  visitor  soon 
spread  through  the  forest,  and  the  members  of  other  tribes,  stealing  in  from 
hour  to  hour,  and  day  by  day,  gazed  upon  him  with  increasing  awe. 
But  as  he  manifested  a  kindness  of  feeling  which  went  to  their  hearts,  the 
awe  which  had  first  inspired  them,  gradually  gave  way  to  a  softer  sentiment. 
They  would  keep  and  show  the  great  visitor  as  a  trophy  and  friend, 
to  their  neighbors.  And  so  with  the  honors  of  a  victor,  rather  than  the 
signs  of  a  captive,  they  took  him  to  all  the  villages  along  the  Chickahominy, 

1  Though  not  thirty  years  of  age,  he  was  already  a  a  beast  in  a  market-place,'  and  was  sent  to  Cohstan- 

veteran  in  the  service  of  humanity  and  Christendom,  tinople  as  a  slave.     A  Turkish  lady  had  compassion 

His  early  life  had  been  given  to  the  cause  of  freedom  on  his  misfortunes  and  his  youth,  and,  designing   to 

in  the  Low  Countries,  where  he  fought  for  the  inde-  restore  him  to  freedom,  removed  him  to  a  fortress  in 

pendence  of    the    Batavian   Republic.     Again,   as    a  the  Crimea.     Contrary  to  her  commands,  he  was  there 

traveler,  he  had  roamed  over  France ;  had  visited  the  subjected   to  the  harshest   usage  among  half-savage 

shores  of  Egypt ;  had  returned  to  Italy  ;  and,  panting  serfs.     Rising  against  his  task-master,  whom  he  slew 

for  glory,  had  sought  the  borders  of  Hungary,  where  in   the   struggle,   he  mounted   a  horse,  and   through 

there  had    long    existed  an    hereditary  warfare  with  forest  paths  escaped  from  thraldom  to  the  confines  of 

the    followers    of   Mahomet.      It  was    there  that  the  Russia.     Again  the  hand  of  woman  relieved  his  wants  ; 

young  English  cavalier  distinguished  himself  by  the  he  traveled  across  the  country  to  Transylvania,  and, 

bravest  feats  of  arms,  in  the  sight  of  Christians  and  there,  bidding  farewell  to  his  companions  in  arms,  he 

infidels,  engaging  fearlessly  and  always  successfully  resolved  to  return  '  to  his  own  sweet  country.'      But, 

in  the  single  combat  with  the  Turks,  which,  from  the  as  he  crossed  the  continent  he  heard  the  rumors  of 

days  of    the  crusaders,   had  been  warranted   by  the  civil  war  in  Northern  Africa,  and  hastened  in  search 

rules  of  chivalry      His  signal  prowess  gained  for  him  of  untried    dangers,    to  the  realms  of    Morocco.     At 

the    favor    of    Sigismund    Bathori,    the     unfortunate  length  returning  to  England,  his  mind  did  not  so  much 

prince  of  Transylvania.     At  length,    he,   with   many  share  as  appropriate  to  itself  the  general  enthusiasm 

others,  was  overpowered  in  a  sudden  skirmish  among  for  planting   states  in  America ;    and  now  the   infant 

the  glens  of  Wallachia,  and  was  left  severely  wounded  commonwealth  of  Virginia  depended  for  its  existenc« 

on  the  field  of  battle.     A  prisoner  of  war,  he  was  now,  on  his  firmness. — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  pp.  127-8. 
according  to  the  eastern  custom,  offered  for  sale  '  like 


JOCAHONTAS   SAVES   CAPTAIN  SMITII'S  LIFE. 


SMITH'S  LIFE  SAVED  BY  POCAHONTAS.  45 

and  on  to  the  Rappahannock,  and  still  further  north,  to  the  Potomac.  At 
last  they  reached  the  residence  of  the  great  chief  Opechaucanough,  at 
Pamunkey.  Here  for  several  days,  they  exhausted  all  the  power  of  theii 
religious  incantations  in  gaining,  from  earth  or  heaven,  some  revelations  of 
the  terrible  mystery  that  hung  around  their  prisoner.  They  could  not  tell 
what  fate  might  be  in  store  for  them.  He  might  have  been  sent  by  the  departed, 
from  their  invisible  homes,  a  beneficent  or  direful  messenger — they  could  not 
tell.  But  so  strong  a  hold  had  Smith  by  this  time  gained  on  their  veneration, 
they  treated  him  with  as  much  hospitality  and  reverence  as  if  he  had  indeed 
been  an  embassador  from  the  Great  Spirit. 

Powhatan. — Smith's  fate  was  at  last  to  be  determined  by  a  chieftain  whose 
name  would  always  have  been  enchanting  enough,  had  it  been  left  to  the 
simple  records  of  authentic  history.  Powhatan  held  sway  over  one  of  the 
fairest,  and  what  was  afterwards  to  become  one  of  the  most  classic  regions 
of  the  continent.  Those  same  fields  were  to  witness  the  crowning  struggle 
of  the  American  Revolution  j  those  shining  rivers  were  to  be  crossed  by  the 
glittering  battalions  of  France  and  England;  the  defeat  of  Cornwallis,  and 
the  laurels  won  by  Lafayette,  were  to  be  mentioned  in  the  same  breath  with 
which  our  children  utter  the  familiar  names  of  the  heroes  of  the  Revolution. 

Powhatan  held  his  court,  from  which  there  was  no  earthly  appeal.  He 
was  himself  arrayed  in  all  the  splendor  of  his  savage  royalty.  Near  him  sat 
his  chiefs  in  council,  and  a  dusky  cloud  of  savage  warriors  and  squaws,  all 
decked  out  as  if  for  a  festival,  hovered  around  the  scene  of  judgment. 
Terror  dictated  the  verdict :  this  strange  and  awful  being  must  die.  As  ht 
was  motioned  to  bend  his  neck  for  the  fatal  tomahawk,  Pocahontas,  the  young 
daughter  of  Powhatan,  sprung  to  his  breast,  and  clung  to  it  with  the  agony  of 
pity,  devotion  and  terror.1 

The  ferocity  of  the  band  was  softened.  The  tomahawks  of  the  execu- 
tioners slowly  came  to  the  ground  ;  and  there,  with  one  arm  still  unlocked 
from  the  embrace,  she  plead  with  his  judges.  She  appealed  with  uplifted 
eyes  to  the  Great  Spirit  above  them ;  in  tenderer  tones  she  told  her  father 
how  the  pale  face  could  make  hatchets  for  him,  and  strings  of  beads  and 
rattles  for  his  favorite  child.  Judgment  was  suspended,  and  in  silence  the 
awe-struck  band  at  last  turned  their  eyes  away  from  this  more  than  mortal 
being,  on  whom  a  higher  power  had  stamped  the  seal  of  sacredness.  It 
was  the  decision  that  he  should  not  only  cease  to  be  a  prisoner,  but  be 
adopted  as  a  friend  and  an  equal  into  the  councils  of  the  nation.  Thus  was 
the  last  hope  of  the  colony  saved  by  the  man  whom  Virginia  to  this  day 
calls  her  father. 

The  released  captive  did  not  at  once  hasten  to  Jamestown.  He  cultivated 
the  acquaintance,  and  sealed  the  friendship  of  Powhatan,  and  made  his 
charming  daughter  a  favorite  companion.     Whatever  trinkets  he  had  with 

1  The  girl  was  of  tenne  or  twelve  years  old,  which  not    spirit  was  the  only  nonpareil  of  the  cc  ■  ntry. — Smiths 
only  for  feature,  countenance,   and   expression  much     Virginia. 
exceeded  any  of  the  rest  of  his  people,  but  for  wit  and 


46  SMITH'S  EXPLORATIONS  OF   THE   CHESAPEAKE. 

him  were  given  to  decorate  the  beautiful  maiden,  ?nd  his  tenderness  to  hei 
won  the  heart  of  the  father.  He  studied  the  language  and  the  manners, 
and  comprehended  the  spirit  of  the  natives.  He  hoped  he  had  linked  them 
in  lasting  friendship  with  his  countrymen.  When  he  returned  to  the  fort — 
master  now,  beyond  a  doubt,  for  he  had  boen  the  saviour  of  the  colony — 
every  few  days  the  friendly  Indians  appeared,  and  Pocahontas  always  came 
with  them.  They  brought  baskets  of  corn  and  other  presents  for  their  pale- 
faced  friends. l 

On  returning  from  his  wanderings  and  captivity,  Smith  found  his  colony 
reduced  to  one  hundred  and  forty  men,  and,  in  their  helplessness,  many  of 
them  had  determined  to  put  to  sea  in  the  little  pinnace.  Their  design  was 
soon  discovered  and  defeated.  They  were  disappointed  in  their  second 
attempt ;  and  in  the  third  and  last,  Smith  crushed  their  scheme  only  by  a 
desperation  which  would  have  cost  any  other  man  his  life.  And  so,  with  the 
hope  of  relief  from  England,  he  sustained  the  last  energies  of  the  colony  by 
the  mingled  firmness  and  humanity  of  his  great  soul. 

Newport  at  last  came,  bringing  with  him  little  of  service  except  the  needed 
supplies,  without  which  they  might  have  continued  to  subsist.  The  hundred 
and  twenty  emigrants  he  brought  were  '  chiefly  vagabond  gentlemen,  and  gold- 
smiths, who,  thinking  they  had  discovered  in  some  of  the  glittering  grains  of 
the  soil  around  Jamestown  evidences  of  gold,  there  was  now  no  talk,  no  work, 
but  dig  gold,  wash  gold,  refine  gold,  load  gold.'  This  is  the  record  Smith 
gives  us.  Newport  was  a  good  sailor,  but  nothing  more.  He  was  seized 
with  the  gold  fever,  and  contrary  to  the  arguments  of  Smith,  and  the  intelli- 
gent assurances  of  Powhatan,  he  went  wild  with  the  fancy  that  the  James 
river  flowed  in  from  the  neighboring  Pacific,  and  that  a  cargo  of  Jamestown 
ore,  with  the  gloss  of  his  own  descriptions,  would  cover  him  with  wealth  and 
glory.  He  idled  away  three  or  four  months,  and  finally  set  sail  for  England 
with  *  a  freight  of  worthless  earth.' 

Summer  of  1608. — But  nothing  diverted  Smith  from  the  achievement  of 
some  practical  results  in  the  broad  field  he  had  entered.  He  did  not  endanger 
the  authority  he  swayed  by  any  unnecessary  severity,  but  showed  what  lenity 
he  could  to  the  follies  of  the  Council,  and  the  vices  of  the  colonists.  He  could 
now  prosecute,  with  some  hope  of  success,  his  explorations  of  the  great  Bay 
of  the  Chesapeake,  and  the  many  rivers  that  flowed  into  it  from  the  northern 
and  western  hills.  He  tells  us  that,  attended  only  by  a  few  companions,  he 
made  two  voyages  in  an  open  boat,  in  which,  by  careful  estimate,  his  oars  had 
carried  him  as  many  miles  as  a  ship  would  sail  in  a  voyage  to  England.     He 

1  Fancy  became  the  first  historian  and  latest  inter-  clime  and  period.     They  are  first  cousins  to  the  Bour- 

jireter  of  these  strange  occurrences.     As  early  as  1608,  bons  of  the  human  family,  who  haunt  chiefly  the  grave- 

an  account  of  them    appeared  in  'The  True  Relation,  yards,  forgetting  all   that  it  is   useful   to  know,  and 

etc.,'   which  contained  much  that  was  incredible.    But  learning    nothing  that  is  worth    acquiring.      Nature 

the  authentic  history  of  the   rescue  of  Smith  by  Po-  has  given  this  class  a  prodigious  capacity  for  doubting 

cahontas,  appeared   by  authority  in  1617,  that  being  everything    good,  and    believing  in   everything  evil. 

\he  date  of  Smith's  'Relation   to  Queen  Anne.'    Many  But  they  have  been  obliged  to  leave  this  bright  little 

attempts  have  been  made  to  cast  doubt  over  the  whole  spot  in  Virginia's  annals  still  green  on  her  fair  record, 

story  ;  but  it  is  as  well  established  as  any  other  fact  in  and  the  pretty  story  of  Pocahontas  will  live  forever  in 

the  history  of  J  jnerica.     Iconoclasts  abound  in  every  the  pages  of  authentic  history. 


SMITH'S  GOVERNMENT  OF   THE  COLONY.  47 

vvent  as  far  as  the  mouth  of  the  Susquehanna,  where  he  made  the  acquaintance 
of  the  Mohawks,  '  who  dwelt  upon  a  great  water,  and  had  many  boats,  and 
many  men,  and  made  war  upon  all  the  world.'  They  had,  indeed,  made  a 
terrible  impression  upon  the  less  warlike  Algonquins  of  the  south ;  for  the 
famous  Mohawks,  then  in  the  prowess  of  their  primitive  strength,  had  dominat- 
ed as  far  as  they  pleased  over  the  wide  region  that  stretched  from  the  northern 
lakes  to  the  south  of  the  Ohio  and  its  tributary  rivers.  Fleets  of  their  canoes 
had  also  been  seen  on  the  waters  of  the  Chesapeake. 

To  these  shore  and  inland  explorations  by  Smith  over  unknown  waters, 
belongs  every  element  of  romance  and  utility.  He  may  well  have  been  struck 
with  the  majesty  of  the  broad  Potomac,  which  spreads  seven  miles  as  it  opens 
to  the  sea.  Tracing  his  course  on  his  own  map,  guided  by  his  descriptions, 
we  find  him  slowly  pulling  against  the  stream  under  the  shades  of  Mt.  Vernon, 
where  Washington's  ashes  now  repose ;  and  passing  up  the  bend  around  the 
heights  of  Arlington,  he  reached  the  falls  above  Georgetown.  But  he  was 
not  satisfied  with  knowing  merely  the  courses  of  these  rivers,  and  the  charac- 
ter of  their  banks.  He  penetrated  the  regions  around  him  in  all  directions. 
Wherever  he  met  Indian  tribes,  they  were  prepared  from  previous  rumors  to 
receive  him  with  deference  and  kindness,  or  he  won  their  favor  by  the  manli- 
ness and  benevolence  of  his  character.  The  beneficial  consequences  that  fol- 
lowed these  well-directed  exertions,  were  to  be  felt  long  after  that  generation 
had  disappeared. 

This  time,  on  his  return  to  Jamestown,  he  was  better  received.  The 
colonists  had  learned  to  prize  the  wisdom  and  thoroughness  of  his  judgment ; 
feeling  their  own  incompetence,  the  members  of  the  Council  elected  him 
President.  He  could  now  invoke  the  authority  of  law  in  the  administration 
of  affairs.  Things  soon  put  on  a  new  face,  and  fortune  seemed  to  favor  them 
from  the  ocean.  Newport's  flag  once  more  came  in  sight,  with  another  ex- 
pedition, bringing  supplies,  with  seventy  emigrants.  Among  them  were  two 
females,  who  had  been  induced  to  risk  their  fortunes,  or  tempt  the  fickle 
goddess,  by  displaying  their  charms  in  fresh  fields. 

The  colonial  Council  in  England  had  not  yet  learned,  however,  what  class 
of  men  was  needed  in  the  new  plantation.  In  addition  to  what  he  had 
hitherto  requested,  Smith  wrote  once  more,  and  in  plainer  terms  :  '  When 
you  send  again,'  he  said,  ■  I  entreat  you  rather  send  but  thirty  carpenters, 
husbandmen,  gardeners,  fishermen,  blacksmiths,  masons,  and  diggers-up  of 
trees'  roots,  well-provided,  than  a  thousand  of  such  as  we  have.'  Here  the 
old  Anglo-Saxon  speaks  out,  for  it  was  nothing  less  than  that  glorious  quality, 
with  which  Smith  was  so  munificently  gifted,  that  ever  dealt  against  the  hard- 
ships of  a  wilderness  life  any  telling  blows  in  the  settlement  of  this  continent. 

1609.— Smith's  Authority. — None  now  were  left  to  dispute  it,  and  he 
became  in  fact  as  well  as  name,  the  ruler  of  the  colony.  In  dividing  up  the 
hours,  he  enforced  six  for  work,  from  all  hands  ;  and  we  are  not  surprised  tc 
learn,  that  under  such  discipline,  even  accomplished  gentlemen  soon  become 


48  SMITH  SUPERSEDED  BY  LORD  DELAWARE. 

acco  nplished  woodcutters.  '  He  who  would  not  work  might  not  eat,'  Smith 
says  was  the  first  item  in  his  code.  But  in  spite  of  this  admirable  system,  less 
than  fifty  acres  of  ground  had  yet  been  tilled  ;  and,  in  the  scarceness  of  pro- 
visions, large  numbers  were  put  upon  the  hospitalities  of  the  natives  in  the 
neighboring  villages.  It  speaks  well  for  Smith's  administration,  as  for  the 
now  proverbial  healthfulness  of  the  region,  that  during  the  year  only  seven 
of  the  colonists  died,  out  of  two  hundred. 

May,  1609. — The  first  object  of  the  London  Council  had  been  the  acquisi- 
tion of  sudden  wealth ;  for  the  golden  lining  still  lingered  along  the  clouds  that 
rested  over  every  western  expedition.  But  better  information  was  being  dis- 
seminated, especially  through  the  writings  of  Hakluyt,  who  placed  upon  Vir- 
ginia a  higher  estimate  as  a  field  for  agriculture,  than  he  had  ever  entertained 
for  gold.  He  says  that  vast  and  honorable  plans  were  now  conceived,  and  an 
appeal  was  made  to  the  wealth  of  London.  The  nobles  and  opulent  gentry, 
with  the  rich  merchants  of  the  Capital  came  forward,  and  under  the  lead  of  the 
now  all-powerful  Lord  Burleigh,  considerable  sums  of  money  were  contributed. 
Through  the  influence  of  the  minister  a  new  charter  was  granted,  clothing  the 
Company  with  higher  powers.  The  Supreme  Council  was  to  be  elected  by  the 
stockholders,  instead  of  being  appointed  by  the  king.  In  fact,  all  their  legis- 
lation was  independent  of  the  throne.  The  governor  of  the  colony  was  after- 
wards to  be  the  executor  of  the  will  of  the  Council  in  London,  and  he  was 
even  invested,  in  some  cases,  with  power  over  life,  involving  the  right  to 
declare  martial  law  at  his  own  discretion.  Most  writers  have  lamented  this 
change  ;  but  from  our  standpoint,  we  hail  with  joy  any  accession  of  strength 
in  money  or  men  for  the  establishment  of  English  civilization  on  this  side  of 
the  ocean.  Some  of  the  immediate  consequences  were  indeed  disastrous. 
To  supersede  Governor  Smith  at  this  time,  was  an  act  of  folly,  as  it  very 
nearly  became  one  of  suicide.  Nor  was  the  choice  altogether  fortunate  in  fall- 
ing upon  Lord  Delaware,  for  had  he  been  endowed  with  every  other  virtue 
under  heaven,  he  was  to  carry  with  him  such  notions  of  rank  and  splendor  as 
would  surround  his  person  with  a  set  of  men  who  could  contribute  nothing 
to  the  prosperity  of  a  youthful  colony.  Idle  and  vicious  favorites  flocked 
about  him,  and  with  visions  of  a  royal  court,  and  the  allurements  of  a  life  of 
spendid  leisure,  and  unlimited  control,  little  good  could  be  seen  in  store  for 
Virginia. 

The  Fever  of  Emigration. — England  was  now  on  fire  for  emigration.  Every- 
body who  wanted  to  better  his  condition  was  ready  to  start.  In  a  short 
time,  nine  vessels  were  ready  for  sea ;  and  the  fleet  sailed,  with  five  hundred 
emigrants  and  abundant  supplies.  Newport  was  made  Admiral,  attended  by 
Sir  John  Somers,  and  Sir  Thomas  Gates,  who  were  to  administer  the  affairs 
of  the  colony  until  the  arrival  of  the  Captain-General,  Lord  Delaware.  Twc 
of  the  vessels  were  wrecked  on  the  Bermudas,  but  the  rest  arrived  in  safety. 
The  description  which  Smith  gives  of  the  character  of  these  new  emigrants. 


SMITH  RETURNS  DISABLED    TO   ENGLAND.  49 

tends  somewhat,  at  least,  to  diminish  the  regret  we  feel  for  their  subsequent 
fate.  He  says  that  they  were  'mostly  dissolute  gallants,  packed  off  to  escape 
worse  destinies  at  home  j  broken  tradesmen,  gentlemen,  poor  in  spirit  and 
purse  ;  rakes,  libertines,  and  worthless  characters.'  From  such  elements 
nothing  but  the  disorder  which  followed  could  be  expected.  Although,  by  the 
abrogation  of  the  old  charter,  Smith's  powers  were  supposed  to  be  ended,  he 
still  held  a  firm  sway  over  the  disorderly  mob,  which  the  colony  might  now 
with  truth  be  called.  He  devised  occupations  ;  he  persuaded  or  enforced 
industry  ;  and  by  his  marvellous  qualities  averted  for  a  while  the  fatal  disor- 
ders which  seemed  so  inevitable.  How  different  a  termination  may  have 
come,  human  prescience  never  could  foretell :  but  the  accidental  explosion 
of  a  quantity  of  gunpowder  wounded  Smith  so  seriously,  that  no  way  of  saving 
his  life  was  possible  except  by  returning  to  England  for  surgical  aid.  After 
delegating  his  authority  to  Percy,  the  best  man  in  the  colony,  and  making  such 
provisions,  and  uttering  such  counsels  as  he  only  could  give,  he  bade  farewell 
to  the  only  spot  which  the  hand  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  had  made  to  bloom  in 
the  western  world.  As  he  reclined  upon  the  deck  of  the  ship  that  carried  him 
home,  worn  by  physical  suffering,  he  was  in  that  sad  hour  spared  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  approaching  calamities  of  his  colony,  and  the  bitter  lot  of  neglect 
and  ingratitude  that  was  to  follow  his  heroic  and  generous  efforts.1 

No  sooner  was  Smith's  hand  of  protection  and  control  withdrawn  from  the 
colony,  than  it  began  to  go  to  destruction.  Idleness  and  confusion  succeed- 
ed industry  and  order.  All  work  was  suspended ;  their  stock  of  provisions 
began  to  give  out,  and  the  Indians  would  no  longer  furnish  them  supplies. 
In  fact,  all  friendly  relations  with  the  natives  had  grown  out  of  their  reverence 
and  affection  for  Smith ;  and  no  occasion  was  now  lost  to  show  their  hostility 
to  the  colonists,  whom  they  had  resolved  to  exterminate.  Every  one  who 
fell  into  their  hands,  was  put  to  death.  Driven  to  dire  extremity,  thirty  of 
the  most  daring  and  dissolute  seized  one  of  the  pinnaces  and  escaped  to  sea, 
to  become  pirates.  In  less  than  six  months  from  the  time  of  Smith's  depart- 
ure, of  the  four  hundred  and  ninety  colonists  only  sixty  were  left ;  and  even 
these  were  on  the  verge  of  starvation. 

In  reviewing  the  history  of  these  early  colonies,  the  number  of  providential 
rescues  we  notice  is  marvellous ;  and  at  this  distance  of  time  we  know  not 
whether  we  are  most  impressed  by  the  folly  and  improvidence  of  man,  or  the 
untiring  beneficence  of  heaven.  Of  the  vessels  which  were  lost  on  the  Ber- 
mudas from  this  expedition,  their  entire  crews  had  got  safely  ashore.     Under 

1  Bancroft  has  left  a  noble  tribute  to  the  Father  of  complished  what  others  esteemed  desperate.     Fruitful 

Virginia  :  Extreme  suffering  from  his  wounds  and  the  in  expedients,  he  was  prompt  in  execution.    Though  he 

ingratitude  of  his  employers,  were  the  fruits  of  his  ser-  had  been    harassed  by  the  persecutions  of  malignant 

vices.     He  received,  for  his  sacrifices  and  his  perilous  envy,  he  never  revived  the  memory  of  the  faults  of  his 

exertions,  not  one  foot  of  land,  not  the  house  he  himself  enemies.      He  was  accustomed  to  lead,  not  to  send  his 

had   built,  not    the   fields  his  own  hands  had  planted,  men  to  danger  ;  would  suffer  want,  rather  than  borrow, 

nor  any  reward  but  the  applause  of  his  conscience  and  and  starve,  sooner  than  not  pay.    He  had  nothing  coun- 

the  world.     He  was  the   Father  of  Virginia,  the  true  terfeit  in  his  nature  ;  but  was  open,  honest,  and  sincere. 

leader  who  first  planted  the  Saxon  race  within  the  bor-  He  clearly  discerned,  that  it  was   the  true  interest  of 

ders  of  the   United   States.      His  judgment  had  ever  England  not  to  seek  in  Virginia  for   gold  and   sudden, 

been  clear,  in   the  midst  of  general  .despondency.    He  wealth,  but  to  enforce  regular  industry.       'Nothing,' 

united  the  highest  spirit  of  adventure  with  consummate  said   he,  'is  to  be  expected  thence,  but  by  labor.' — 

powers  of  action.     His  courage  and  self-possession  ac-  Vol.  L  pp.  138-9. 


50  PROVIDENTIAL  RESCUE   OF   THE   COLONY. 

the  resolute  direction  of  Sir  Thomas  Gates,  they  succeeded  in  constructing 
from  the  cedars  of  the  forest  and  the  remains  of  the  wreck,  two  vessels,  with 
which  they  bravely  worked  their  way  at  last  to  join  the  colony.  But  before 
their  voyage  was  over,  the  few  remaining  colonists  had  determined  to  embark 
in  the  four  pinnaces  still  left,  and  sail  for  Newfoundland  to  escape  the  fate 
that  surely  awaited  them.  With  the  strange  depravity  which  destitution  and 
suffering  engender,  they  had  resolved  on  burning  the  little  town  before  their 
departure.  'Why  not?'  they  said,  and  they  were  proceeding  to  do  it. 
But  Gates  and  his  party  arrived  at  this  moment  of  desperation,  and  through 
Ins  firmness  that  act  wa^  prevented.  Nothing,  however,  could  dissuade  the 
wretched  men  from  their  purpose  to  abandon  the  scene  where,  on  leaving, 
1  none  dropped  a  tear,  for  none  had  enjoyed  one  day  of  happiness.'  Finding 
his  best  efforts  unavailing,  Gates  reluctantly  turned  his  back  upon  the  deser- 
ted, but  fortunately  not  destroyed  town.  He  was  the  last  man  to  go  on  board. 
But  the  hopes  of  Virginia  were  in  safer  keeping.  The  current  had  carried 
them  down  but  a  few  miles,  when  they  came  in  sight  of  the  barge  of  Lord 
Delaware,  whose  squadron  stood  off  the  mouth  of  the  river.  All  ideas  of 
Newfoundland  now  vanished,  and  with  the  help  of  a  fair  wind  the  pinnaces 
were  that  evening  moored  once  more  safely  under  the  fort  of  Jamestown. 

June  10,  1610. — In  a  few  hours  how  changed  the  scene  !  Lord  Delaware's 
fleet  lay  anchored  in  the  river ;  Sir  Thomas  Gates,  with  his  companions,  so 
marvellously  saved  from  wreck  on  the  rocks  of  Bermuda,  had  escaped  the 
fate  of  drowning,  or  death  by  starvation  !  and  the  remnant  of  Smith's  colony 
had  been  rescued  as  if  by  a  miracle.  In  such  hours  the  heart  of  helpless 
man  turns  instinctively  to  pay  its  homage  of  recognition  and  gratitude  to  his 
Almighty  Father.  In  this  instance  the  recognition  was  complete.  The 
homage  could  not  be  withheld,  and  the  gratitude  was  sincere.  We  do  not 
wonder  at  finding  these  words,  as  they  recorded  them  :  '  It  is  the  arm  of  the 
Lord  of  Hosts,  who  would  have  His  people  pass  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Wil- 
derness, and  then  possess  the  Land  of  Canaan.'  'Doubt  not,'  was  their 
language,  in  writing  home  to  their  friends,  '  God  will  raise  our  State,  and 
build  his  church  in  this  excellent  climate.' 

The  piety  of  the  colonists  had  erected  a  rude  little  log-cabin  church,  and  it 
was  now  profusely  decorated  with  wild  flowers  from  the  forest.  In  this  tiny 
temple — not  vainly  erected  to  the  great  Creator,  and  which  shone  on  the  eyes 
of  bending  spirits  in  that  far-off  wilderness,  brighter  than  the  jewelled  altars 
and  gilded  domes  of  the  fairest  cathedrals  of  Europe — the  whole  company 
now  gathered.  The  beautiful  service  of  the  Church  of  England  was  read, 
and  the  whole  scene  was  one  of  adoration,  gratitude,  and  tears. 

Lord  Delaware  assembled  his  Council,  and  read  his  commission  and  in- 
structions ;  and  when  the  fires  of  that  evening  sun  faded  out  in  the  tops  of 
the  mighty  forest-trees  that  sheltered  the  banks  of  the  James  River,  order, 
peace  and  joy  reigned  in  the  rescued  settlement  of  Jamestown. 


LORD  DELAWARE   COMPELLED    TO  RETURN.  5* 

The  colony  now  consisted  of  two  hundred  men.  Vice  and  idleness  were 
banished ;  industry  and  providence  were  restored ;  and  with  a  cheerfulness 
unknown  before,  everybody  began  to  work.  The  natives  were  not  slow  to 
witness  the  change,  and  they  were  awed  into  the  appearance  of  friendship  by 
the  sight  of  these  new  signs  of  power.  The  transformation  from  its  former 
condition  was  complete,  and  kinder  skies  seemed  to  be  bending  over  the 
majestic  shores  of  the  glorious  river  which  was  afterwards  to  reflect  from  its 
crystal  bosom  all  the  emblems  of  Christian  civilization. 

Under  Lord  Delaware's  firm  and  unexpectedly  wise  rule,  the  conditior. 
of  the  colony  was  every  dav  improving.  Comfortable  dwellings  were  con- 
structed ;  heavy  timbers  wc  scored  and  hewn,  rude  boards  and  plank  were 
sawed  by  hand,  and  Indian-made  gaily  colored  mattings  of  bark  and  wild 
grasses,  covered  the  floors.  Nothing  was  needed  but  the  presence  of  woman 
to  add  the  last  element  of  strength  and  symmetry  to  complete  the  structure 
of  civilized  life.  But  the  health  of  Lord  Delaware  gave  way.  Exhausted  by 
constant  cares,  and  change  of  climate,  he  was  obliged  to  return  to  England. 
The  consequences  were  disastrous.  Percy,  his  deputy,  although  well  enough 
disposed,  could  not  fill  his  place,  and  a  feeling  of  the  deepest  discouragement 
depressed  the  spirits  of  the  colonists.  Since  the  glamour  of  gold  had  passed 
away,  no  more  tales  of  fairy-land  were  to  be  told,  and  no  profitable  returns  had 
been  made  to  the  stockholders.  The  Supreme  Council  began  to  lose  their  in- 
terest, and  look  upon  their  investment  as  lost.  The  whole  scheme  was  brought 
into  disfavor.  The  disgust  of  the  public  found  expression  through  satirical 
pamphlets,  and  representations  in  the  theatres — those  two  instruments  for 
wielding  public  opinion  in  those  days,  for  which  we  have  substituted  the 
creations  of  the  Briarean  Press.  The  friends  of  Virginia  came  to  the  rescue, 
and  one  of  the  Jamestown  colonists  indignantly  said, — '  This  plantation  has 
undergone  the  reproofs  of  the  base  world.  Our  own  brethren  laugh  us  to 
scorne  ;  and  Papists  and  players,  the  scum  and  dregs  of  the  earth,  mocke  such 
as  help  to  build  up  the  walls  of  Jerusalem.' 

Sir  Thomas  Dale,  May  10,  1611. — The  cause,  however,  was  steadily 
gaining  ground,  and  multitudes  of  the  unemployed, — and  what  was  even  then 
deemed,  surplus  population  of  England, — were  every  day  looking  with  more 
interest  towards  American  shores.  Before  the  return  of  Lord  Delaware,  the 
Supreme  Council  had  dispatched  Sir  Thomas  Dale,  with  liberal  supplies.  He 
immediately  proclaimed  martial  law  in  the  colony,  as  Delaware's  successor, 
and  showed  his  code,  which  had  been  drawn  up  by  himself.  Having  been  an 
old  soldier  in  the  war  of  the  United  Provinces,  it  was  but  a  transcript  of  their 
rules  of  war,  and  this  code  he  proceeded  vigorously  to  enforce.  Every  spark 
of  personal  or  civil  freedom  was  quenched.  It  was  a  narrow  field  for  such 
pitiful  despotism,  and  even  he  saw  how  bootless  would  be  his  reign.  In 
writing  to  the  Council,  he  did  not  try  to  conceal  the  feebleness  of  the  colony, 
nor  could  he  help  applauding  their  spirit  of  patient  endurance.  He  said, — 
'If  anything  otherwise  than  well  betides  me,   let  me  commend  unto  youi 


52  ADMINISTRATION  OF  SIR    THOMAS  GATES. 

carefulness  the  pursuit  and  dignity  of  this  business,  than  which  your  purse?  aud 
endeavors  will  never  open  in  a  more  meritorious  enterprise.  Take  four  of  the 
best  kingdoms  in  Christendom,  and  put  them  all  together,  they  may  no 
way  compare  with  this  country,  either  for  the  commodities  or  goodness 
of  soil.' 

Of  these  facts  the  colony,  and  Englishmen  generally,  were  well  persuaded, 
and  the  influence  of  Lord  Delaware,  and  the  judgment  and  virtue  of  Gates, 
determined  the  Council  to  prosecute  the  business  they  had  undertaken,  with 
greater  earnestness  and  decision.  They  wisely  committed  the  new  expedition 
to  his  hands.  Six  well-equipped  and  liberally  provisioned  ships  were  fitted 
out,  and  three  hundred  emigrants,  of  a  better  class,  were  taken  by  Gates  to 
Virginia.  Another  matter  of  importance  was  not  overlooked :  one  hundred 
good-blooded  cows,  bulls,  and  oxen  were  put  on  board,  and  well  cared  for  on 
the  voyage.  Their  offspring  are  still  grazing  on  the  green  banks  of  the  James 
River. 

We  cannot  forego  one  glance  more  at  the  great  Raleigh,  who,  stripped  of 
almost  every  other  consolation  from  the  outside  world,  learned  in  the  Bloody 
Tower  that  Cecil,  his  lifelong  and  malignant  enemy,  was  lending  his  best  in- 
fluence as  minister  of  the  crown  for  the  colonization  of  Virginia,  in  whose 
fortunes  the  illustrious  prisoner  cherished  a  heart-interest  to  the  last.  Heaven 
has  graciously  decreed  that  its  best  helpers  in  the  work  of  human  advance- 
ment, should  sometimes  live  long  enough  to  see  those  enterprises  on  which 
they  bestowed  the  best  energies  of  their  active  years,  finally  carried  to  their 
consummation  with  the  aid  and  applause  of  those  who  either  withheld  all  as- 
sistance when  most  needed,  or  on  which  they  heaped  obloquy  in  the  begin- 
ning. If  this  was  not  one  of  the  rarest,  it  was  certainly  one  of  the  most  signal 
instances,  in  illustration  of  this  blessed  truth. 

Administration  of  Sir  Thomas  Gates. — The  sudden  appearance  of  a  fleet 
towards  the  last  of  August,  in  response  to  Dale's  appeal  of  the  preceding 
spring,  filled  the  colonists  with  apprehensions  at  first,  lest  some  powerful 
enemy  might  be  approaching.  But  this  was  soon  followed  by  demonstrations 
of  joy.  Again  the  little  temple  was  crowded  with  glad  and  thankful 
worshippers,  and  the  government  of  Gates  was  inaugurated  with  the  solemni- 
ties of  Christian  worship.  Nor  was  one  single  day  enough  to  be  dedicated  to 
this  high  purpose  :  morning  and  evening  prayers  were  said  in  the  church 
every  day.  The  author  of  Lawes  Divine  relates  that  at  matin  and  vesper  the 
colonists  tenderly  repeated  the  prayer — '  Lord  bless  England,  our  sweet  na- 
tive country.'      > 

Gates'  wise  Administration. — Prosperity  now  attended  the  colony.  It  grew 
in  numbers  ;  agriculture  became  a  settled  pursuit ;  the  neighboring  Indian 
tribes  all  displayed  a  more  friendly  spirit,  and  some  of  them  were  ready  to 
give  their  allegiance  to  the  British  King.  Gates  was  sagacious  and  liberal, 
and  comprehended  the  conditions  of  colonial  success.     No  unnecessary  hard 


IMPROVEMENT  IN  THE  COLONY.  53 

ships  or  restraints  were  imposed,  although  severity  enough  was  practised  to 
preserve  order.  To  all  deserving  parties,  titles  to  small  parcels  of  land  we  re 
granted  for  planting  orchards  and  gardens,  and  thus  becoming  interested  in 
the  soil,  the  colonists  began  to  feel  that  their  homes  were  actually  established 
three  thousand  miles  away  from  England.  Gradually  the  Domestic  Council 
was  allowed  larger  discretion  and  authority  in  the  management  of  their  local 
affairs,  and  the  disposition  to  dictate,  relaxed  in  England. 

March  12,  16 12. — In  the  spring  of  this  year,  another  patent  was  granted 
for  Virginia.  New  parties  became  interested  by  the  concession  of  greater 
rights  and  privileges.  The  corporation  gained  larger  control,  and  somewhat 
of  an  independent  spirit  was  infused  into  its  management.  The  Company  was 
allowed  to  hold  weekly  meetings,  elect  their  own  officers,  and  manage  their 
own  affairs.  No  political  rights  whatever  were  conferred  upon  the  colonists ; 
but  the  Government  grants  gave  wider  scope  to  the  activity  of  the  Company, 
and  more  deeply  interested  the  stockholders:  Among  other  privileges,  they 
were  allowed  to  establish  lotteries,  for  a  while — unpopular  as  they  were  in 
England — and  from  this  source  they  realized  large  sums,  until  they  were  sup- 
pressed as  a  public  evil,  after  the  notice  of  Parliament. 

The  Natives  still  badly  Treated. — But  it  is  lamentable  to  relate  that  just  in 
proportion  as  the  colony  at  Jamestown  grew  in  numbers  and  stability,  the  less 
consideration  was  shown  to  the  native  inhabitants.  Frequent  forays  were 
made  on  the  Indian  villages,  in  one  of  which  Pocahontas,  the  daughter  of 
Powhatan,  was  stolen.  The  motive  for  this  abominable  act  at  the  time,  seems 
to  have  been  the  extortion  of  a  considerable  ransom  from  the  Indian  chief. 
But  the  wrong  had  only  inflamed  his  animosity,  and  in  the  pride  of  his  man- 
hood, he  prepared  to  resent  the  insult  with  hostilities.  But,  as  good  fortune 
would  have  it,  it  was  not  to  be  so  luckless  an  affair  for  any  of  the  parties  con- 
cerned. Among  the  colonists  were  many  men  of  sincere  religious  convictions, 
John  Rolfe  being  especially  distinguished  for  his  pious  enthusiasm.  To  spread 
the  knowledge  of  Christianity  among  the  savages,  was  his  dream  by  night  and 
day.  In  the  artless  description  of  his  own  feelings,  he  says, — '  The  Holy 
Spirit  demanded  of  me  why  I  was  created ; '  and  in  the  perplexity  of  seeking 
the  right  road  to  travel,  he  was  told  that  he  must  follow  the  indications  of  di- 
vine light,  without  regard  to  '  the  censure  of  the  low-minded.'  He  frankly 
confesses  that  his  heart  was  leading  him  one  way,  while  his  conscience  seemed 
to  be  pointing  in  another.  But  it  ended  in  that  happy  compromise  which 
usually  follows  such  struggles  :  Love  got  the  best.  In  some  way  he  sur- 
rounded those  awkward  barriers  with  which  Moses  fenced  in  his  refractory 
subjects,  but  within  whose  enclosure  Christian  sheep  have  so  meekly  staid  for 
centuries.  Why  should  the  maledictions  which  the  young  gentlemen  of  the 
house  of  Levi  suffered  for  bringing  heathen  women  into  the  family  circle,  be 
visited  upon  him  ?  He  might  at  least  hope  that  heaven  would  hear  his 
prajrer  for  the  chieftain's  daughter ;  and  so  with  right  good-will  he  went  to 


54      LOVE,  CONVERSION,  AND  MARRIAGE  OF  POCAHONTAS. 

work  *  for  the  conversion  of  the  unregenerated  maiden.'  Pocahontas  seems 
to  have  returned  his  passion.  She  adopted  the  beautiful  religion  of  her  lover 
with  admirable  docility ;  and  the  first  Christian  marriage  we  have  any  account 
of  celebrated  by  the  English  race  in  Virginia,  'came  off'  in  the  little  rustic 
church  at  Jamestown.  It  had  already  been  consecrated  by  more  solemn, 
though  less  beautiful  scenes.  The  temple  '  rested  on  rough  pine  col- 
umns, fresh  from  the  forest,  and  was  in  a  style  of  rugged  architecture  as  wild, 
if  not  as  frail,  as  an  Indian's  wigwam, — she  stood  before  the  font,  '  that  out  of 
the  trunk  of  a  tree,  had  been  hewn  hollow,  like  a  canoe ; '  openly  renounced 
her  country's  idolatry,  professed  the  faith  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  was  baptized. 
The  gaining  of  this  one  soul,  the  first  fruits  of  Virginian  conversion,  was  fol- 
lowed by  her  nuptials  with  Rolfe,  in  April,  1614,  to  the  joy  of  Sir  Thomas 
Dale,  and  with  the  approbation  of  her  father  and  friends.  Opachisco,  her 
uncle,  gave  the  bride  away,  and  she  stammered  before  the  altar  her  marriage 
vows,  according  to  the  rites  of  the  English  service.' 

Pocahontas  Visits  England:  Summer  of  16 16. — The  bride,  under  the — 
what  sounds  to  us  so  truly  barbarous,  although  truly  Christian  name — Mrs. 
Rolfe,  went  to  school,  like  a  good  girl,  to  her  new  master,  and  soon  acquired 
a  marvellous  facility  in  the  English  tongue. 

Two  years  had  gone  by  since  the  nuptials,  and  she  was  '  dying  of  curiosity ' 
to  see  England.  With  a  laudable  spirit  of  acquiescence,  the  husband  yielded, 
and  the  happy  pair  sailed  for  that  distant  country.  Among  the  best  classes 
and  at  the  court,  she  excited  the  greatest  admiration.  She  became  a  mother, 
which  made  her  an  object  of  deeper  interest  and  affection.  She  had  been 
overwhelmed  and  delighted  with  the  magnificence  of  her  adopted  country. 
She  at  last  desired  to  return  to  her  native  land.  But  the  sudden  transition 
from  the  wild  freedom  of  her  former  life,  and  exposure  to  an  ungenial 
climate,  were  too  much  for  the  daughter  of  the  Indian  chief,  who  had  drawn 
her  first  breath,  and  passed  her  sunny  youth  in  the  paradise  air  of  Virginia. 
When  everything  was  ready  for  her  return,  she  committed  her  little  child  to 
the  care  of  a  tender  husband,  and  made  her  grave  in  England.  But  her  name 
has  been  fondly  cherished  in  the  hearts  of  the  millions  who  have  read  her 
gentle  story,  and  the  pride  of  some  of  the  noblest  names  that  have  adorned 
the  scrolls  of  Virginia,  has  claimed  relationship  with  her  blood. 

This  was  a  crowning  event  in  the  history  of  the  colony.  The  bereaved 
old  chieftain  had  not  only,  with  all  his  tribe,  sworn  lasting  friendship  to  the 
colonists,  and  loyalty  to  the  king,  but  the  powerful  tribe  of  the  Chickahomi- 
nies  offered  their  alliance,  and  desired  to  become  subjects  of  the  great  mon- 
arch over  the  big  water.  Some  blending  of  the  two  races  followed  this  first 
Indian  marriage,  over  which  no  regret  seems  ever  to  have  been  uttered  :  but 
this  mingling  did  not  extend  very  far,  and  another  illustration,  of  which  the 
history  of  the  English-speaking  race  furnishes  us  so  many,  was  offered  to 
show,  that  the  intercourse  between  them  and  the  aborigines  of  other  lands 
has  thus  far  never  succeeded,  on  a  large  scale,  in  the  blending  of  the  races. 


I  RUIN  OF  THE  FRENCH  COLONY  IN  ACADIA.  5b 

1613. — But  we  revert  to  the  year  which  witnessed  the  successful  termina 
tion  of  Mr.  Rolfe's  missionary  enterprise,  to  notice  an  event  which  one 
hundred  and  fifty  years  later  kindled  a  war  that  blazed  round  all  the  earth. 
Samuel  Argall,  16 13. — This  violent  and  arbitrary  man  made  a  great  deal 
of  trouble  for  the  London  Company,  and  their  colonists  in  America.  He  was 
a  sailor,  and  had  command  of  an  armed  vessel  which  was  maintained  osten- 
sibly for  the  protection  of  English  fishermen  on  the  Newfoundland  banks. 
The  French  had  commenced  a  settlement  on  Mt.  Desert  Isle,  near  the 
Penobscot  River,  and  built  the  little  hamlet  of  St.  Sauveur.  The  Governor 
of  th:  Virginia  colony,  claiming  the  sole  right  to  the  coast  as  far  north  as  45 
degrees,  Argall  determined  to  break  up  the  French  settlement.  His  cannon 
opened  the  way  for  the  landing,  and  his  musketry  soon  gave  him  possession 
of  the  place.  The  cross  around  which  they  had  clustered  their  dwellings, 
was  thrown  down,  and  the  terrified  inhabitants  fled  to  the  vessels  in  the 
harbor.  Many  of  them  succeeded  in  escaping  in  one  which  carried  them 
back  to  St.  Malo,  while  the  rest  were  taken  captive  and  sent  to  the  Chesa- 
peake. But  the  infamous  work  of  Argall  was  not  yet  complete.  He  returned 
again,  and  burned  the  deserted  settlement  of  Port  Royal,  and  throwing  down 
the  arms  of  France,  and  destroying  the  fortifications  on  the  Isle  of  St.  Croix, 
he  set  up  the  arms  of  England  over  the  ruins  of  the  French  in  Acadia.  It 
was  these  acts  of  piratical  barbarity  that  began  the  collision  between  the 
French  and  the  English  in  North  America,  which  ended  only  in  the  fall  of 
Quebec  in  1759,  a  century  and  a  half  later,  which  swept  out  the  last  vestige 
of  French  power  on  the  Atlantic  coast,  and  in  the  northern  portion  of  the  con- 
tinent. 

Return  of  Sir  Thomas  Gates  to  England,  March,  16 14. — This  estimable 
and  discreet  man,  who  had  managed  the  affairs  of  the  colony  so  well,  thought 
he  could  render  a  higher  service  at  home,  by  reviving  the  drooping  resolution 
of  the  London  Council ;  and  leaving  the  government  in  the  hands  of  Dale,  he 
embarked  for  England.  In  the  following  May,  on  his  representations,  a 
petition  was  presented  to  the  House  of  Commons,  for  aid  to  the  Virginia 
colony  ;  and  it  was  nobly  advocated  by  Lord  Delaware,  who,  with  the  simple 
appeal,  'All  it  requires  is  a  few  honest  laborers,  burdened  with  children,' 
procured  a  committee  to  consider  the  subject  But  King  James  had  already 
begun  to  involve  his  ill-fated  race  in  the  collision  with  the  British  Commons, 
which,  after  long  and  repeated  struggles,  was  to  end  in  bringing  the  head  of 
his  son  to  the  block  at  Whitehall,  and  to  be  followed  later  by  the  ignominious 
expulsion  of  his  grandson  from  the  throne  of  England.  The  House  of  Com- 
mons was  dissolved,  and  the  Virginia  colony  left  to  shift  for  itself.  Here 
Bancroft  well  remarks,  that  '  It  was  not  to  lotteries,  or  privileged  companies, 
to  Parliaments  or  Kings,  that  the  new  State  was  to  owe  its  prosperity.  Pri- 
vate industry,  directed  to  the  culture  of  tobacco,  was  to  enrich  Virginia.' 

We  must  new  rapidly  glance  at  the  social  condition  of  the  colonists  of 


56  ONLY  FIFTY-L OUR  COLONISTS  LEFT. 

Virginia,  up  to  the  year  1619,  when  Sir  George  Yeardley  arrived  to  assume 
its  government 

Up  to  this  time,  twelve  years  had  passed  from  the  first  settlement,  and 
its  history  had  been  marked  by  constantly  recurring  scenes  of  disaster, 
confusion,  and  blood.  The  London  Company  had  treated  colonization  as  a 
speculation,  and  its  best  members  were  powerless  to  accomplish  much  good. 
Ignorance,  avarice,  arbitrary  rule,  and  heartless  oppression,  had  characterized 
the  government  of  the  colony.  Most  of  its  agents  were  unprincipled ;  and 
the  few  good  men  entrusted  with  power,  found  their  best  designs  defeated. 
Moreover,  the  colonists  themselves  being  chosen  from  those  classes  that 
never  furnish  the  material  for  building  up  permanent  institutions,  it  was  mer- 
cifully ordered  that  better  elements  were  to  be  substituted  for  the  structure 
of  society  that  was  afterwards  to  rise  on  the  Virginia  soil.  The  colonists  had 
emigrated  under  all  sorts  of  inducements,  except  such  as  were  likely  to  com- 
mand desirable  characters.  Not  many  of  them  would  have  succeeded  any- 
where ;  least  of  all,  under  such  wretched  management.  Only  a  few  became 
interested  in  the  'soil,  as  proprietors ;  most  of  them  had  been  sent  out  at 
the  expense  of  the  company,  and  remained  their  servants,  instead  of  rising 
into  honorable  citizenship.  Dale  and  Gates  had  offered  tracts  of  land  under 
more  or  less  favorable  conditions.  But  there  was  no  established  policy,  such 
as  was  afterwards  adopted  in  all  the  other  colonies,  where  it  was  clearly 
understood  that  homestead  binds  men  to  the  glebe  stronger  than  villanage. 
The  hostilities  of  the  native  tribes,  which  had  been  so  wantonly  provoked, 
rendered  life  at  all  times  insecure,  and  repeatedly  brought  the  settlement  to 
the  verge  of  extinction.  Even  as  late  as  161 7,  there  were  but  fifty-four 
colonists  left  at  Jamestown,  men,  women,  and  children,  all  told.  The  rule 
of  Argall  was  most  fatal  of  all.  He  was  young,  hot-headed,  and  tyrannical. 
He  governed  by  martial  law  on  land,  and  had  procured  himself  to  be  made 
Admiral  of  the  surrounding  seas,  which  clothed  him  with  the  attributes  of  a 
tyrant  and  a  freebooter. 

Lord  Delaware  Embarks  again  for  America,  T617. — With  the  exception  of 
Raleigh,  no  man  in  her  early  history  felt  a  deeper  interest  in  Virginia  than 
Lord  Delaware.  Learning  the  hopeless  condition  of  the  colony  under  the 
blighting  rule  of  Argall,  he  induced  the  company  to  fit  out  another  expedition, 
and  with  a  large  number  of  emigrants,  he  sailed  once  more  to  take  command 
at  Jamestown,  and  save  the  remains  of  the  colony.  But  this  estimable  noble- 
man had  overtaxed  his  strength  in  making  his  preparations ;  and  although 
some  English  authorities  assert  that  he  died  in  England,  yet  all  the  writers  on 
Virginia  agree  that  he  died  on  the  voyage.  Thus  a  further  lease  was  granted 
to  the  tyranny  of  Argall.     But  it  was  to  be  brief. 

One  of  the  colonists  had  been  unjustly  condemned  to  death  by  Argall,  and 
an  appeal  for  clemency  was  made  for  the  first  time  to  the  mother  country. 
Foreseeing  his  fate,  this  infamous  character  escaped  from  the  colony,  with 
such  spoils  as  he  and  his  freebooters  had  extorted.     The  colony  was  saved 


ARRIVAL  OF  YEARDLEY  AT  JAMESTOWN.  57 

by  the  earnest  persuasion  of  the  enlightened  and  estimable  Sir  Edwin  Sandys 
through  whose  influence  Yeardley  was  appointed  Captain-General. 

Condition  of  the  Colony  on  Yeardley' s  Arrival. — The  best  authorities  agree 
that  of  the  large  number  of  emigrants  who  had  been  sent  out  during  twelve 
years,  not  one  in  twenty  was  now  alive.  In  Jamestown  the  only  buildings  leff 
standing  were  those  erected  by  Sir  Thomas  Gates  j  one  the  Governor's  resi- 
dence, and  the  other  our  favorite  little  church,  which  was  '  fifty  foote  in  length, 
and  twenty  in  breadth.'  In  the  small  settlement  of  Henrico,  where  the  city 
of  Richmond  now  stands,  there  were  only  '  three  old  houses,  and  a  poor  ruin- 
ated church,  with  some  poore  buildings  in  the  islande.'  The  Church  of 
England  was  by  law  the  established  religion,  and  two  of  its  ministers  were  do- 
ing the  best  they  could.  The  old  friendliness  of  the  Indians  was  soon  extin- 
guished on  the  death  of  Pocahontas  and  her  father,  and  the  prospects  for  the 
permanent  establishment  of  an  Agricultural  State  in  Virginia  were  dark  indeed. 

On  the  arrival  of  Yeardley,  however,  a  more  enlightened  and  efficient  ad- 
ministration began.  It  had  been  made  plain  to  the  London  Council  that  a 
different  policy  must  be  adopted,  and  the  views  of  some  of  their  best  men 
were  listened  to.  The  great  Lord  Bacon,  among  others,  had  turned  his  at- 
tention to  Virginia  colonization,  and  as  early  as  the  embarkation  of  Newport  on 
his  first  voyage,  he  had  likened  the  expedition  to  the  fabled  Amadis  de  Gaul. 
Seeing  wiser  counsels  prevail,  he  uttered  the  memorable  prophecy  at  the 
time  of  Yeardley' s  departure  : — '  Certainly  it  is  with  the  kingdoms  of  earth  as 
it  is  in  the  kingdom  of  Heaven ;  sometimes  a  grain  of  mustard-seed  proves  a 
great  tree  :  who  can  tell  ?  ' 

It  is  refreshing  indeed  to  find  that  the  most  glorious  men  of  England,  at  this 
turning  period  of  her  own  political  destinies,  as  well  as  of  the  shaping  of  ours, 
saw  the  future  rise  of  the  English  race  in  the  western  wilderness,  with  such 
clearness  of  vision.  It  makes  us  feel  more  tenderly  towards  Raleigh  ;  it  in- 
spires us  with  greater  veneration  for  the  stupendous  genius  of  Bacon :  our 
blood  kindles  quicker  at  the  name  of  the  heroic  Smith :  we  think  more  geni- 
ally of  the  Earl  of  Southampton,  the  friend  of  Shakespeare,  and  the  steady 
friend  of  Virginia :  and  above  all  does  it  bring  the  divine  Shakespeare  himself 
nearer  to  our  hearts.  One  and  all,  they  are  household  names  in  every  home 
of  culture  in  the  Western  Hemisphere. 

The  Political  Life  of  Virginia  Begins.  Inauguration  of  Yeardley,  July  30, 
1619. — The  new  Captain-General  made  a  proclamation  to  the  plantations,  an- 
nouncing his  commissions  and  instructions  from  the  Company.  His  mission 
was  •  the  better  establishinge  of  a  commonwealth  j  those  cruell  lawes  by  which 
the  ancient  planters  had  soe  longe  been  governed,  were  now  abrogated,  and 
they  were  to  be  governed  by  those  free  lawes  which  his  majesties  subjectes  lived 
under  in  Englande.  That  the  planters  might  have  a  hande  in  the  governing 
of  themselves,  yt  wasgraunted  that  agenerallassemblie  shoulde  be  helde  yearly 
once,  whereat  were  to  be  present  the  governor  and  counsell,  with  two  burgesses 


58  FIRST  LEGISLA  TIVE  ASSEMBjl  V  IN  AMERICA. 

from  each  plantation,  freely  to  be  elected  by  the  inhabitantes  thereof,  thin  as- 
semblie  to  have  power  to  make  and  ordaine  whatsoever  lawes  and  ordeis 
should  by  them  be  thought  good  and  profitable  for  their  subsistence.' 

In  pursuance  of  these  instructions,  the  Governor  •  sente  his  summons  all 
over  the  country,  as  well  to  invite  those  of  the  counsell  of  estate  that  were  ab- 
sente,  as  also  for  the  election  of  burgesses.'  On  the  30th  day  of  July  the 
delegates  from  the  eleven  plantations  assembled  at  James  City. ' 

First  Legislative  Assemblage  in  America. — Few  as  were  their  numbers, 
their  proceedings  were  dignified  by  all  the  solemnities  of  a  full  Parliament. 
They  elected  a  speaker,  Mr.  John  Pory,  who  was  a  counsellor,  and  Secretary 
of  the  colony  ;  and  when  he  took  his  seat,  their  deliberations  were  opened  by 
a  solemn  appeal  of  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England,  for  the  blessing  of 
Almighty  God — an  example  followed  in  American  legislative  assemblies  ever 
since.  The  next  act  was  a  motion  to  accept  the  great  charter.  '  It  had  the 
general  assent  and  the  applause  of  the  whole  assembly,  with  thanks  to  Al- 
mighty God.'  Basing  all  their  actions  upon  the  concessions  made  to  the 
colony  by  the  London  Company,  which  they  treated  as  the  fountain  of  all 
their  rights  and  authorities,  they  found  in  it  their  political  charter ;  and 
while  they  acknowledged  their  loyalty  to  it,  they  emphatically  announced  that 
they  retained  the  liberty  of  seeking  redress  '  in  case  they  should  find  aught 
not  perfectly  squaring  with  the  state  of  the  colony.' 
* 

All  the  proceedings  of  this  first  legislative  assembly  held  in  the  New  World 
are  worthy  of  the  closest  study.  They  have  from  that  time  constituted  a 
model  for  legislative  proceedings,  and  have  ever  been  quoted  as  a  parliamentary 
manual,  by  the  statesmen  of  Virginia.  All  the  doings  of  this  young  Par- 
liament were  marked  with  order  and  dignity  ; 1  and  the  laws  they  enacted  were 
carried  at  once  into  execution.  A  new  spirit  of  good  feeling  and  encourage- 
ment pervaded  the  settlements,  and  the  colony  began  to  put  on  the  aspects  of 
well-ordered  society.  '  From  this  time,'  they  tell  us,  '  we  fell  to  building  houses 
and  planting  corn,  for  we  regarded  Virginia  as  our  country.' 

Sir  Edwin  Sandys,  as  Treasurer  of  the  London  Company,  thoroughly  investi- 
gated, and  made  a  full  expose  of  its  affairs.  They  had,  during  the  first  twelve 
years  of  their  existence,  expended  eighty  thousand  pounds,  and  of  the  thousands 
of  emigrants  sent  out  hardly  six  hundred  souls  remained.  But  he  submitted  a 
plan  for  future  action  so  clear  and  convincing  that  it  was  warmly  adopted, 
and  all  the  new  elected  council  was  composed  of  liberal  and  patriotic  men. 

1  The  Church  of  England  was  confirmed  as  the  Indians,  '  the  most  towardly  boys  in  wit  and  graces  of 
Church  of  Virginia  ;  it  was  intended  that  the  first  four  nature  should  be  brought  up  in  the  first  elements  of 
ministers  should  each  receive  two  hundred  pounds  a  literature,  and  sent  from  the  college  to  the  work  of  con- 
year  ;  all  persons  whatsoever,  upon  the  Sabbath  days,  version  '  of  the  natives  to  the  Christian  religion.  Pen- 
were  to  frequent  divine  service  and  sermons  both  fore-  alties  were  appointed  for  idleness,  gaming  with  dice  or 
noon  and  afternoon  ;  and  all  such  as  bore  arms,  to  cards,  and  drunkenness.  Excess  in  apparel  was  taxed 
bring  their  pieces  or  swords.  Grants  of  land  were  in  church  for  all  public  contributions.  The  business  of 
asked  not  for  planters  only,  but  for  their  wives,  'be-  planting  corn,  mulberry  trees,  hemp,  and  vines  was  en- 
cause,  in  a  new  plantation,  it  is  not  known  whether  man  couraged.  The  price  of  tobacco  was  fixed  at  three 
or  woman  be  the  most  necessary.'  Measures  were  shillings  a  pound  for  the  be*st,  and  half  as  much  '  for  the 
adopted  '  towards  the  erecting  of  a  university  and  col-  second  sort.' — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  pp.  155-6. 
lege.'*     it  was  also  enacted,  that  of  the  children  of  the 


{„„„_.„.„.  , 
be  Tieasurer  was  authorized  to  carry  his  measures  into  vigorous  operation 
th  the  assurance  of  support 
From  this  time  the  prosperity  and  permanence  of  the  Virginia  colony 
emed  to  be  placed  upon  a  stable  foundation.  Within  twelve  months  San- 
dys sent  over  twelve  hundred  and  sixty-one  emigrants,  all  of  whom  understood 
that  they  were  going  to  find  themselves  homes. 

A  new  element  was  also  invoked.  There  had  hitherto  been  no  induce- 
ments for  the  better  class  of  women  to  join  the  colony,  and  well-regulated 
families  could  hardly  be  persuaded  to  do  so.  But  Sandys'  reputation  for  in- 
tegrity and  candor,  with  his  earnest  persuasions,  induced  one  hundred  '  agree- 
able, young  and  virtuous '  women  to  emigrate,  since  their  outfit  and  voyage 
would  be  paid  by  the  Company,  and  they  were  assured  of  a  kind  and  respectful 
welcome.  Of  course  they  ultimately  contemplated  marriage  with  the  settlers, 
and  on  their  arrival  they  were  not  disappointed.  They  readily  found  good 
husbands,  who  guaranteed  their  comfortable  support,  and  to  refund  to  the 
company  the  expenses  it  had  incurred.  The  liquidation  of  these  debts  was 
to  be  made  in  tobacco,  the  only  currency  of  the  colony,  this  being  equiva- 
lent then,  as  it  is  now,  to  gold,  in  the  English  market.  The  price  of  a  wife 
was  settled  at  one  hundred  pounds  of  the  'beguiling  weed.'  The  thing 
worked  so  well,  that  the  next  year  a  company  of  sixty  others  was  sent,  who, 
we  are  assured,  were  'maids  of  virtuous  education,  young,  handsome,  and 
well  recommended.'  With  the  improvement  in  the  quality  of  this  class  of 
emigrants,  the  price  of  a  wife  rose  from  one  hundred  to  one  hundred  and  fifty 
pounds  of  tobacco.  The  whole  transaction  was  wise  and  fortunate.  The 
manners  and  morals  of  the  colony  improved.  Married  men  had  preference 
in  all  things.  Industry,  thrift,  cleanliness,  and  all  the  amenities  which  society 
owes  to  woman,  marked  the  new  period.  Before  three  years  had  gone  by, 
the  number  of  colonists  rose  to  four  thousand. 

May  17,  1620. — This  year  of  the  efficient  administration  of  Sandys  deter- 
mined the  stability  of  the  Virginia  colony.  Dark  days  were  indeed  before 
them,  and  many  were  to  fall  by  a  cruel  massacre,  while  others  were  to  suffer 
terrible  misfortunes.  But  the  colony  was  no  longer  to  be  imperilled,  and  it 
was  striking  its  roots  deep  into  the  soil.  In  choosing  Sandys'  successor,  a 
new  and  deeper  interest  in  colonization  was  displayed.  The  struggle  in  the 
election  was  earnest  and  bitter  ;  but  the  patriot  party  prevailed,  and  the  Earl 
of  Southampton  was  called  to  its  administration.  The  King  had  attempted 
to  interfere  in  the  election ;  but  the  Company  threw  themselves  upon  the 
guaranties  of  their  charter,  and  had  everything  their  own  way,  undisturbed. 
The  administration  of  Yeardley  was  wise  and  lenient,  and  he  was  allowed  the 
largest  scope  in  administering  the  laws,  and  securing  the  rights  of  the.  colo- 
nists. Trial  by  jury  was  forever  established.  The  acts  of  the  Colonial  As- 
sembly were  confirmed,  and  thus  a  distinct  recognition  of  their  independence 
in  legislation  was  made. 


60  INTRODUCTION  OF  NEGRO  SLAVERY. 

July  24,  162 1. — During  this  year,  a  written  Constitution  was  established 
for  Virginia,  containing  all  the  cardinal  principles  of  the  British  Constitution. 
It  served  as  a  model  for  nearly  all  the  constitutions  that  were  subsequently 
adopted  by  the  colonies  that  were  planted  in  the  South.  It  declared  that  its 
purpose  was  '  the  greatest  comfort  and  benefit  to  the  people,  and  the  preven- 
tion of  injustice,  grievances  and  oppression.'  The  Governor  was  to  be 
appointed  by  the  Company  in  London,  and  with  him  a  permanent  Council. 
The  General  Assembly  was  to  hold  yearly  sessions,  and  be  composed  of  the 
councillors,  and  two  burgesses  chosen  from  each  of  the  plantations  by  univer- 
sal suffrage.  All  the  laws  were  to  be  enacted  by  the  Assembly.  The  usual 
right  of  veto  was  reserved  to  the  Governor,  and  all  ordinances  were  required 
to  be  ratified  by  the  Company  in  England.  The  grand  clause  was  also  inserted, 
that  no  orders  of  the  Company  in  London  should  be  binding  on  the  colon} 
until  they  had  been  ratified  by  the  General  Assembly.  Courts  of  justice  were 
required  to  conform  their  procedure  to  the  judicial  standards  of  England. 

Civil  Liberty  Established  in  Virginia. — We  thus  find  the  first  free  State 
founded  in  the  western  world.  The  system  of  representative  government, 
with  trial  by  jury,  constituting  the  two  chief  pillars  on  which  the  superstruc- 
ture of  civil  liberty  was  to  rise  in  America,  had  now  been  settled.  In  spirit, 
and  in  fact,  the  General  Assembly  was  a  Parliament,  acknowledging  allegiance 
to  the  British  sovereign  as  King  of  Virginia.  With  all  these  reforms  the  name 
of  the  Earl  of  Southampton,  Shakespeare's  friend,  will  forever  be  associated. 
He  was  one  of  the  broadest-minded  and  most  liberal-spirited  men  of  his  time. 
He  fought  steadily  against  every  illiberal  restriction,  and  proposed  and  advo- 
cated the  extension  of  the  largest  franchises  of  freedom. 

The  people  of  Virginia  may  not  only  be  excused,  but  applauded,  for  tak- 
ing pride  in  the  events  we  have  here  recorded.  It  was  on  their  soil  that  the 
foundations  of  free  institutions  in  America  were  first  laid.  It  was  on  the 
banks  of  the  James  River  that  the  first  permanent  colony  of  Anglo-Saxons  was 
planted.  There,  was  opened  the  first  nursery  of  American  statesmanship ; 
there  was  promulgated  the  first  written  constitution  which  contained  the  ele- 
ments of  self-government ;  and  to  her  glory  be  it  said  that  she  was  ever  after- 
wards to  preserve  the  priceless  rights  she  inherited. 

Introduction  of  Negro  Slavery. — But  by  the  decree  of  a  Power — against 
which  all  human  efforts  and  designs  are  unavailing — while  the  Tree  of  Liberty 
was  taking  root  on  that  soil,  the  fatal  Upas  was   being  planted  side  by  side 
Here  we  may  appropriately  quote  the  words  of  Charles  Sumner,  in  a  letter  to 
the  New  England  Society  of  New  York,  December  21,  1863  : 

1  Amid  all  the  sorrows  of  a  conflict  without  precedent,  let  us  hold  fast  to 
the  consolation  that  it  is  in  simple  obedience  to  the  spirit  in  which  New  Eng- 
land was  founded,  that  we  are  now  resisting  the  bloody  efforts  to  raise  a 
wicked  power  on  the  corner-stone  of  Human  Slavery,  and  that  as  New  Eng- 


SMITH  ON  THE  NEW  ENGLAND  COAST.  6* 

landers  we  could  not  do  otherwise.  If  such  a  wicked  power  can  be  raised  on 
this  continent,  the  Mayflower  traversed  its  wintry  sea  in  vain. 

1  We  remember  too  that  another  ship  crossed  at  the  same  time,  buffeting 
the  same  sea.  It  was  a  Dutch  ship  with  twenty  slaves,  who  were  landed  at 
Jamestown,  in  Virginia,  and  became  the  fatal  seed  of  that  Slavery  which  has 
threatened  to  overshadow  the  land.  Thus  the  same  ocean,  in  the  same  year, 
bore  to  the  Western  Continent  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  consecrated  to  Human 
Liberty,  and  also  a  cargo  of  slaves.  In  the  holds  of  those  two  ships  were  the 
germs  of  the  present  direful  war  ;  and  the  simple  question  now  is  between  the 
Mayflower  and  the  slave  ship.  Who  that  has  not  forgotten  God  can  doubt 
the  result  ?     The  Mayflower  must  prevail.'  • 

To  that  Pilgrim  ship  we  shall  shortly  turn. 

Captain  John  Smith  on  the  Coast  of  New  England. — March,  1614. — We 
left  the  Father  of  Virginia  returning  prostrate  from  the  accident  which  had 
disabled  him  in  Virginia.  Despairing  in  his  efforts  to  inspire  the  London 
Council  with  a  wiser  policy  in  the  management  of  the  Virginia  colony,  but 
with  an  interest  in  American  colonization  still  unabated,  he  turned  his  atten- 
tion, after  the  recovery  of  his  health,  to  maturing  a  scheme  that  might  better 
reward  enterprise  further  north  on  the  continent.  The  Plymouth  Company 
had  made  little  use  of  their  charter,  which  had  been  granted  at  the  same  time 
as  the  one  for  Virginia ;  but  their  rights  had  not  expired.  Still  adhering,  with 
the  firmness  of  settled  conviction,  to  the  belief,  that  colonization  in  the  west 
was  the  true  interest  of  the  British  Government,  and  the  British  people,  he 
endeavored  to  impress  his  convictions  upon  the  members  of  that  body. 
Meantime,  whUe  he  was  waiting  for  his  arguments  to  take  effect,  he  induced 
four  merchants  of  London  to  unite  with  him  in  a  private  trading  adventure, 
to  sail  for  what  had  then  begun  to  be  called  Northern  Virginia.  In  the 
event  of  '  not  finding  gold,'  they  were  to  carry  on  traffic  with  the  Indians, 
and  secure  a  cargo  of  dried  fish,  which  was  to  be  disposed  of  at  Malaga. 

He  sailed  with  two  vessels.  Reaching  the  Penobscot,  he  examined  and 
mapped  the  coast  from  that  river  to  Cape  Cod,  and  gave  to  the  territory  the 
name  of  New  England — a  name  which,  being  confirmed  by  Prince  Charles, 
was  to  remain.  His  venture  was  successful ;  and  in  the  seventh  month  from 
his  departure  from  England,  he  had  returned  safely  with  his  principal  ship. 
The  other  had  been  left  in  charge  of  Thomas  Hunt,  whose  avarice  was  sati- 
ated only  by  the  perpetration  of  a  crime  which  had  been  better  left  to  the 
freebooters  of  Spain.  He  became  a  kidnapper,  and  stole  as  many  of  the 
natives  as  he  could  entice  on  board — '  poor  innocents,'  indeed,  as  they  were 
termed — and  sold  them  in  the  great  slave-market  of  the  world — Spain.  There 
is  a  blessed  consolation  in  the  fact  which  history  is  always  recording,  however 
much  bad  men  may  deride  it  as  a  dogma  of  religion,  that  '  the  wrath  of  man 
shall  praise  God.'  Some  good  even  came  out  of  this.  One  of  the  chiefs  of 
the  \  idnapped  party  escaped  from  slavery  in  Spain,  and  found  his  way  to 

1  Lester's  Li/i  and  Public  Services  of  Charles  Sumner,  pp.  467-8. 


62  SMITH'S  SECOND  EXPEDITION  TO  NEW  ENGLAND. 

England,  where,  being  kindly  received,  and  taught  the  English  language,  he 
was  subsequently  taken  back  to  his  native  country,  and  became  a  useful  inter- 
preter between  the  English  and  the  native  tribes,  maintaining  his  friendship 
for  the  colonists  to  the  last. 

Smith's  Second  Expedition  to  New  England,  1615. — The  success  of  his 
first  voyage  won  the  favor  of  Sir  Ferdinando  Gorges,  and  other  members  of 
the  Plymouth  colony ;  and  although  they  would  furnish  him  with  but  a  small 
vessel,  and  sixteen  adventurers,  with  these  he  started.  But  hostile  tempests 
drove  him  back.  Undismayed,  he  put  out  again,  when  his  vessel  was  seized 
by  French  pirates  and  taken  into  the  harbor  of  Rochelle.  But  the  intrepid 
hero  escaped  at  night  in  an  open  boat,  and  reached  the  shores  of  England. 

He  now  published  a  *  map  and  a  description  of  his  New  England,'  and 
scoured  the  whole  of  the  west  of  the  island  with  the  zeal  of  a  crusading 
Peter.  He  gave  away  copies  to  a  large  number  of  influential  persons,  to 
excite  an  interest  in  the  cause  of  colonization.  He  inflamed  the  cupidity  of 
the  merchants  with  the  prospects  of  gain,  as  he  had  shown  his  own  voyages 
to  be  prosperous  ;  he  appealed  to  noblemen,  through  their  lust  for  dominion 
and  power  ;  to  the  romantic,  by  vivid  descriptions  of  scenery,  and  the  charms 
of  game,  with  the  wild  freedom  of  the  forest,  '  angling  and  crossing  the  sweet 
air  from  isle  to  isle,  over  the  silent  streams  of  a  calm  sea  : ' — and  in  the  dis- 
contented, and  ambitious,  he  kindled  hopes  for  a  nobler  condition  of  life. 
This  time  the  force  of  his  genius  prevailed.  He  wished  to  give  resurrection 
to  the  old  Plymouth  charter,  and  success  to  a  Plymouth  colony ;  and  so  far 
was  he  successful  in  moving  the  minds  of  influential  classes,  that  rivalries  soon 
sprang  up,  and  the  strife  waxed  warm  in  intrigues  and  persuasions  to  gain 
new  concessions  from  the  government.  The  party  was  sure  to  prevail  which 
had  the  favor  of  the  Crown.  Prince  Charles  gave  a  ready  ear  to  the  solicita- 
tions of  his  favorites ;  and  his  father,  the  King,  was  induced  to  grant  to  forty 
men  the  most  extraordinary  charter  ever  heard  of.  They  were  called  '  The 
Council  established  at  Plymouth,  in  the  County  of  Devon,  for  planting,  ruling, 
ordering  and  governing  New  England  in  America.'  They  received  in  fee-sim 
pie  an  absolute  grant  of  all  the  lands  and  waters  from  the  40th  to  the  48th 
degree  of  north  latitude,  stretching  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific,  wherever 
that  might  be.  It  covered  all  of  New  England  and  New  York,  more  than  half 
of  New  Jersey,  and  nearly  all  of  Pennsylvania.  Nothing  was  withheld  from 
the  clean  sweep  of  the  pen  :  the  fisheries  and  islands  along  the  coast ;  the 
entire  monopoly  of  navigation ;  trade  in  the  interior  with  the  Indians  :  and ' 
absolute  control  over  emigration  and  commerce.  All  the  inhabitants  were 
placed  under  their  rule  ;  and  however  little  reliance  might  be  placed  on  other 
sources  of  income,  it  was  certain  that  this  gigantic  corporation  could  grow 
rich  by  the  imposition  of  whatever  duties  they  pleased  to  lay  on  all  the  ton- 
nage employed  in  the  fisheries  of  the  western  Atlantic. 

The  fever  of  colonization  now  rose  high  in  England.     The  King  had 


CLAIMS  OF  SMITH  TO  AMERICAN   GRATITUDE.  63 

issued  a  royal  proclamation  confirming  this  Parliamentary  grant.  Prince 
Charles  was  its  chief  patron,  and  an  interested  party.  Powerful  nobles,  :ich 
merchants,  and  daring  and  reckless  adventurers,  who  were  favorites  at  court, 
blended  harmoniously  in  the  new  enterprise.  Surely  there  was  something  sub- 
stantial, on  which  to  build  the  most  extravagant  hopes,  when  all  these  elements 
of  power  and  success  were  brought  together. 

The  confidence  of  the  Plymouth  colony  in  Smith  had  been  so  great  that 
they  had  appointed  him  Admiral  for  life ;  and  now  they  entered  into  the  strife 
for  obtaining  greater  and  more  clearly  defined  privileges.  But  it  proved  a 
vain  effort.  The  new  monopolists  succeeded,  and  hereafter  the  old  Company 
disappears. 

Here  too  we  part  with  Captain  John  Smith  : — a  name  that  will  in  all  com- 
ing ages  be  uttered  by  all  true  American  lips  with  something  of  the  feeling 
which  inspired  George  S.  Hillard,  in  the  close  of  his  charming  and  best  of  all 
the  biographies  of  this  intrepid  pioneer  of  American  colonization — '  The 
debt  of  gratitude  which  we  of  this  country  owe  to  Captain  Smith  can  hardly 
be  exaggerated.  With  the  exception  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh — and  perhaps 
Richard  Hakluyt — no  one  did  so  much  towards  colonizing  and  settling  the 
coast  of  North  America.  The  State  of  Virginia  is  under  peculiar  obligations 
to  him  as  its  virtual  founder ;  since  without  his  remarkable  personal  qualities 
and  indefatigable  exertions,  the  colony  at  Jamestown  could  never  have  taken 
root.  In  reading  the  history  of  his  administration,  we  are  made  to  feel  in 
regard  to  him,  as  we  do  in  regard  to  Washington,  when  we  contemplate  the 
events  of  the  American  Revolution  :  that  he  was  a  being  specially  appointed 
by  divine  Providence  to  accomplish  the  work  entrusted  to  him.  He  was 
exactly  fitted  for  the  place  which  he  filled,  and  not  one  of  his  many  remarka- 
ble gifts  could  have  been  spared  without  serious  detriment. 

*  His  claims  upon  the  gratitude  of  the  people  of  New  England  are  hardly 
inferior.  He  was  the  first  to  perceive  the  advantages  held  out  by  it  as  a 
place  of  settlement,  in  spite  of  its  bitter  skies  and  iron-bound  coast,  and  to 
correct  the  erroneous,  unfavorable  impressions  prevalent  concerning  it. 
Though  he  himself  had  no  direct  share  in  the  settlement  of  Plymouth,  yet 
without  doubt  it  was  owing  to  the  interest  which  had  been  awakened  by  his 
writings  and  personal  exertions,  that  the  ranks  of  the  colonists  were  so  soon 
swelled  by  those  accessions  of  men  of  character  and  substance,  which  gave 
them  encouragement,  and  insured  them  prosperity  and  success.  It  was  the 
peculiar  good  fortune  of  Captain  Smith  to  stand  in  so  interesting  a  relation 
to  the  two  eldest  States  in  the  Union,  and  through  them  to  the  northern  and 
southern  sections  of  the  country.  The  debt  of  gratitude  due  to  him  is  national 
and  American,  and  so  should  his  glory  be.  Wherever  upon  this  continent 
the  English  language  is  spoken,  his  deeds  should  be  recounted,  and  his 
memory  hallowed.  His  services  should  not  only  be  not  forgotten,  but  should 
be  'freshly  remembered.'  His  name  should  not  only  be  honored  by  the 
silent  canvas,  and  the  cold  marble,  but  his  praises  should  dwell  living  upon 


64 


THE  PILGRIMS  IN  HOLLAND. 


the  lips  of  men,  and  should  be  handed  down  by  fathers  to  their  children 
Poetry  has  imagined  nothing  more  stirring  and  romantic  than  his  life  an  J 
adventures,  and  History,  upon  her  ample  page,  has  recorded  few  more  hon- 
orable and  spotless  names.'  ■ 

The  Pilgrims  in  Holland. — But  while  this  stupendous  scheme  of  the 
court,  its  favorites,  and  the  monopolists  of  England,  was  absorbing  public 
attention,  a  small  band  of  exiles  from  their  native  land,  who  had  found  *~i 
asylum  in  Holland  from  the  religious  persecution  of  England,  were  silentfy 
maturing  by  faith,  prayer,  and  stalwart  heroism,  a  plan  of  colonization  whiJi 
was  as  far  to  eclipse  all  the  feeble  attempts  of  lords,  merchants,  and  poten- 
tates, as  the  noiseless  processes  of  nature  surpass  the  puny  parades  of  rm  n. 
We  need  not  enter  into  the  European  history  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  •  as 
Webster  said  of  them  and  their  descendants, — *  The  world  knows  it  by  heavt : 
the  past,  at  least,  is  secure.' a 


1  After  summing  up  Captain  Smith's  noble  charac- 
ter, Mr.  George  S.  Hillard,  in  his  'Life  and  Adven- 
tures of  Captain  John  Smith/  says  of  his  writings  : 

'  He  was  alive  to  the  beautiful  and  grand  in  the  out- 
ward world,  as  his  animated  descriptions  testify ;  and 
above  all,  his  style  is  characterized  by  fervor,  earnest- 
ness, and  enthusiasm.  His  heart  is  in  everything 
which  he  writes.  His  mind  is  warmed  and  kindled  by 
the  contemplation  of  his  subject,  and  it  is  impossible  to 
read  any  of  his  works — after  being  accustomed  to  his 
intiquated  diction — without  ourselves  catching  a  por- 
tion of  their  glow.  If  he  has  not  the  smoothness,  he 
has  not  the  monotony  of  a  professed  man  of  letters. 
His  style  has  the  charm  of  individuality.  It  has  a  pic- 
ture-like vividness  arising  from  the  circumstance,  that 
he  describes,  not  what  he  lias  heard,  but  what  he  has 
seen  and  experienced. 

4  Reading  his  tracts,  as  we  do  now,  with  the  comment- 
ary which  the  lapse  of  two  centuries  has  given  them, 
we  cannot  but  wonder  at  the  extent  of  his  knowledge, 
the  accuracy  of  his  observation,  and  the  confidence, 
amounting  almost  to  inspiration,  with  which  he  makes 
predictions,  which,  it  is  needless  to  say,  have  been 
most  amply  fulfilled.  Had  he  done  nothing  but  write 
his  books,  we  should  have  been  under  the  highest  obli- 
gations to  him  ;  and  the  most  impartial  judgment  would 
have  assigned  to  him  an  honorable  station  among  the 
authors  of  his  age.' 

And  of  his  death  : 

'The  death  of  Captain  Smith  occurred  in  1631,  at 
London,  in  the  fifty-second  year  of  his  age.  We  know 
nothing  of  the  circumstances  which  attended  it,  and 
we  are  equally  ignorant  of  his  domestic  and  personal 
history  ;  with  whom  he  was  related  and  connected, 
where  he  resided,  what  was  the  amount  of  his  fortune, 
•vhat  were  his  habits,  tastes,  personal  appearance,  man- 
ners, and  conversation  ;  and  in  general,  of  those  per- 
sonal details  which  modest  men  commonly  do  not  re- 
cord about  themselves.' — Life  and  Adventures  of 
Ca/>t.  John  Smith,  by  George  S.  Hillard,  in  Sparks' 
American  Biography,  vol.  ii.  pp.  388,  395-7. 

2  And  now  the  English  at  Leyden,  trusting  in  God 
and  in  themselves,  made  ready  for  their  departure. 
The  ships  which  they  had  provided — the  Speedwell,  of 
sixty  tons,  the  Mayjlower,  of  one  hundred  and  eighty 
tons, — could  hold  but  a  minority  of  the  congregation  ; 
and  Robinson  was  therefore  detained  at  Leyden,  while 
Brewster,  the  governing  elder,  who  was  also  able  as  a 
teacher,  conducted  '  such  of  the  youngest  and  strongest 
as  freely  offered  themselves.'  Every  enterprise  of  the 
Pilgrims  began  from  God.  A  solemn  fast  was  held. 
*  Let  us  seek  of  God,'  said  they,  '  a  right  way  for  us, 
and  for  our  little  ones,  and  for  all  our  substance.'  An- 
ticipating their  high  destiny,  and  the  sublime  doctrines 
of  liberty  that  would  grow  out  of  the  principles  on  which 
their  religious  tenets  were  established,  Robinson  gave 
them  a  farewell,  breathing  a  freedom  of  opinion,  and  an 
independence  of  authority,  such  as  were  then  hardly 
known  in  the  world. 


'•I  charge  you,  before  God  and  his  blessed  angw/s, 
that  you  follow  me  no  further  than  you  have  seen  me 
follow  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  The  Lord  has  rr  ore 
truth  yet  to  break  forth  out  of  his  holy  word.  I  ca  not 
sufficiently  bewail  the  condition  of  the  reformed  chui  .hes 
who  are  come  to  a  period  in  religion,  and  will  „o  at 
present  no  further  than  the  instruments  of  their  refor- 
mation.—Luther  and  Calvin  were  great  and  shining 
lights  in  their  times,  yet  they  penetrated  not  un  *o  die 
whole  counsel  of  God. — I  beseech  you,  rememb'  r  it, — 
'tis  an  article  of  your  church  covenant, — that  >ou  be 
ready  to  receive  whatever  truth  shall  be  made  known 
to  you  from  the  written  word  of  God.' 

'  When  the  ship  was  ready  to  carry  us  away  writes 
Edward  Winslow,  "  the  brethren  that  staid  at  Leyden, 
having  again  solemnly  sought  the  Lord  with  us  and  for 
us,  feasted  us  that  were  to  go,  at  our  pastor*  house 
being  large ;  where  we  refreshed  ourselves,  aft*  .•  tears, 
with  singing  of  psalms,  making  joyful  melod",  in  our 
hearts,  as  well  as  with  the  voice,  there  being  many  of 
the  congregation  very  expert  in  music  ;  and  indeed  it 
was  the  sweetest  melody  that  ever  mine  ea  s  heard. 
After  this,  they  accompanied  us  to  Delft  Hav  :n,  where 
we  went  to  embark,  and  then  feasted  us  ag  tin  ;  and 
after  prayer  performed  by  our  pastor,  when  a  flood  of 
tears  was  poured  out,  they  accompanied  us  \  >  the  ship, 
but  were  not  able  to  speak  one  to  another  for  the  abun- 
dance of  sorrow  to  part.  But  we  only,  goLig  aboard, 
gave  them  a  volley  of  small  shot,  and  thre :  pieces  of 
ordnance  ;  and  so,  lifting  up  our  hands  to  ^ach  other, 
and  our  hearts  for  each  other  to  the  Lord  \  ur  God,  we 
departed.'  A  prosperous  wind  soon  waits  the  vessel 
to  Southampton,  and,  in  a  fortnight,  the  Mayflower 
and  the  Speedwell,  freighted  with  the  n/st  colony  of 
New  England,  leave  Southampton  for  A  merica.  But 
they  had  not  gone  far  upon  the  Atlantic  before  the 
smaller  vessel  was  found  to  need  rep.-.irs,  and  they 
entered  the  port  of  Dartmouth.  After  tl  e  lapse  of  eight 
precious  days,  they  again  weigh  anchor  ;  the  coast  o| 
England  recedes  ;  already  they  are  unfurling  their  sails 
on  the  broad  ocean,  when  the  captain  c  f  the  Speedwell, 
with  his  company,  dismayed  at  the  dangers  of  the  en- 
terprise, once  more  pretends  that  hL  ship  is  too  weak 
for  the  service.  They  put  back  to  Plymouth  "and  agree 
to  dismiss  her,  and  those  who  are  willing,  return  to 
London,  though  this  was  very  grievous  and  discourag- 
ing." Having  thus  winnowed  their  numbers,  the  little 
band,  not  of  resolute  men  only,  but  wives,  some  far 
gone  in  pregnancy,  children,  iniants,  a  floating  village, 
yet  but  one  hundred  and  two  souls,  went  on  board  the 
single  ship,  which  was  hired  only  to  convey  them  across 
the  Atlantic  ;  and,  on  the  sixth  day  of  September,  1620, 
thirteen  years  after  the  first  colonization  in  Virginia, 
two  months  before  the  concession  of  the  grand  charter 
of  Plymouth,  without  any  warrant  from  the  sovereign 
of  England,  without  any  useful  charter  from  a  corporate 
body,  the  passengers  in  the  Mayflower  set  sail  for  a 
new  world,  where  the  past  could  offer  no  favorable  au- 
guries — Bancroft,  vcl.  i.  p.  306-308. 


EMBARKATION   OF    THE  PILGRIMS.  65 

Embarkation  of  the  Pilgrims,  September  6,  1620. — At  last  the  Mayflower 
was  ready  for  sea,  and  she  lifted  her  anchor  for  the  Bay  of  New  York ;  for 
the  Pilgrims  had  intended  to  settle  near  the  mouth  of  the  Hudson.  Fifty 
five  men — 21  with  families,  one  hundred  and  two  in  all !  After  a  long  and 
stormy  passage  of  sixty-three  days,  they  gained  their  first  sight  of  land  ;  and 
two  days  later  the  Mayflower  swung  to  her  moorings  in  the  harbor  of  Cape 
Cod.  Their  purpose  of  settling  on  the  banks  of  the  Hudson  was  irrevocably 
overruled  by  the  Providence  which  directed  their  fortunes ;  as  the  Virginia 
Colony,  which  had  sailed  for  the  coast  of  North  Carolina,  was  driven  by  a 
tempest  into  the  broad  bay  of  the  Chesapeake.  Historians  have  indulged  in 
fanciful  conjectures  as  to  how  different  would  have  been  the  results,  in  either 
case.  But  such  speculations  belong  to  the  vague  '  history  of  events  which 
have  never  happened,'  which  is  the  realm  of  the  romancer,  rather  than  to 
the  sober  record  of  facts,  which  is  reserved  for  the  historian. 

Before  any  person  had  left  the  ship,  the  whole  company  assembled  in  the 
cabin,  and  entered  into  a  voluntary  compact,  in  the  following  words  : 

1  In  the  name  of  God,  Amen.  We  whose  names  are  underwritten,  the 
loyal  subjects  of  our  dread  Sovereign,  King  James,  having  undertaken,  for 
the  glory  of  God,  and  advancement  of  the  Christian  faith,  and  honor  of  0111 
King  and  country,  a  voyage  to  plant  the  first  Colony  in  the  northern  parts  of 
Virginia,  do,  by  these  presents,  solemnly  and  mutually,  in  the  presence  of 
God,  and  of  one  another,  covenant  and  combine  ourselves  together,  into  a 
civil  body  politic,  for  our  better  ordering  and  preservation,  and  furtherance 
of  the  ends  aforesaid.  And  by  virtue  hereof,  to  enact,  constitute,  and  frame, 
such  just  and  equal  laws,  ordinances,  acts,  constitutions,  and  offices,  from 
time  to  time,  as  shall  be  thought  most  convenient  for  the  general  good  of  the 
Colony.     Unto  which  we  promise  all  due  submission  and  obedience.'1 

1  To  this  instrument  Mr.  Morton  sets  the  subscrib-  N.  B.   i.     Those  with  this  mark  (*)   brought  theii 

ers  in  the  following  order  :  but  their  names  corrected,  wives  with  them  ;    those  with  this  (t),  for  the  present, 

with  their  titles  and  families,  I  take  from  the  list  at  the  left  them  either  in  Holland  or  England, 

end  of  governor  Bradford's  folio  manuscript.      Only  2.  Some  left  behind  them  part,  and  others  all  their 

this  I  observe,  that  out  of  modesty  he  omits  the  title  of  children,  who  afterwards  came  over. 

Mr.  to  his   own   name,  which   he   ascribes  to   several  3.  Those  with  this  mark  (§)  deceased  before  the  end 

others.  of  March. 

NO.  IK  no.  at 

NAMES  FAMILY.  NAMES.  FAMILY. 

i.  Mr.  John  Carver,* 8 

2.  William  Bradford,* 2 

3.  Mr.  Edward  Winslow,* 5 

4.  Mr.  William  Brewster,* 6 

5.  Mr.  Isaac  Allerton,* 6 

6.  Capt.  Miles  Standish,* 2 

7.  John  Alden, 1 

8.  Mr.  Samuel  Fuller,t 2 

9.  Mr.  Christopher  Martin,*  § 4 

10.  Mr.  William  Mullins,*  § 5 

11.  Mr.  William  White,*  § 5 

12.  Mr.  Richard  Warren,  t 1 

13.  John  Howland 

14.  Mr. 


Stephen  Hopkins,* 8 

Edward  Tilly,*  § 4 

16.  John  Tilly,*  § 3 

1 7.  Francis  Cook.t 2 

18.  Thomas  Rogers,§ 2 

19.  Thomas  Tinker,*  § 3 

20.  John  Rigdale,*  § 2 

21.  Edward  Fuller,*  § 3 

2a.  John  Turner,§ 3 

a.  He  was  of  governor  Carver's  family.  c.    He  was  of  Mr.  Hopkins's  family. 

b.  He  was  of  governor  Winslow' s  family. 

— Prince's  Chronological  History  of  New  England,  p.  172,  Boston,  1826. 


23.  Francis  Eaton,* 3 

24.  James  Chilton,*  § 3 

25.  John  Crackston,§ 2 

26.  John  Billington,* 4 

27.  Moses  Fletcher,§ a 

28.  John  Goodman, § 1 

29.  Degory  Priest,  § 1 

30.  Thomas  Williams,§ 1 

31.  Gilbert  Winslow 

32.  Edmund  Margeson,§ 1 

33.  Peter  Brown, ■ 

34.  Richard  Britterige,  § - 

35.  George  Soule,  b. 

36.  Richard  Clarke,  § 1 

37.  Richard  Gardiner, x 

38.  John  Allerton,  § I. 

39.  Thomas  English,  § I 

40.  Edward  Dotey,  c 

41.  Edward  Leister,  c. 


66  LANDING   ON  THE  ROCK  OF  PLYMOUTH. 

Forty  one  signed  the  paper.  John  Carver  was  unanimously  chosen  Gov- 
ernor for  one  year,  and  thus,  constitutional  Democracy  was  born  in  the  cabin 
of  the  Mayflower.  A  State  was  inaugurated — the  first  one  of  the  kind  in  the 
history  of  the  world. 

The  desolations  of  an  Arctic  winter  were  already  sweeping  down  the  coast, 
and  it  was  necessary  to  go  ashore  and  fix  on  a  site  for  their  habitation. 
When  the  shallop  was  unshipped,  she  was  found  not  to  be  seaworthy,  and  many 
days  were  required  for  repairs.  Impatient  of  delay,  Miles  Standish  and  Gov. 
Bradford,  with  a  few  resolute  companions,  landed,  covered  with  frozen  spray. 
1  Tired  with  marching  up  and  down  the  steep  hills  and  deep  valleys,  which 
lay  half  a  foot  thick  with  snow,  they  searched  in  vain  for  inhabitants  ;  but 
they  came  upon  a  heap  of  maize,  and  an  Indian  graveyard.'  But  they  ■  saw 
no  more  corn,  nor  anything  else  but  graves.'  In  landing  again  the  next 
morning  at  daybreak,  they  were  greeted  by  a  flight  of  arrows  from  the  natives, 
who  had  hitherto  known  Englishmen  only  as  kidnappers.  Taking  to  theii 
shallop  again,  they  beat  along  the  coast,  searching  for  a  harbor,  for  many  hours, 
through  a  blinding  storm,  which  at  last  became  so  wild  their  rudder  was 
lost,  their  mast  broken  in  three  pieces,  while  thick  night  was  closing  around 
them.  But  the  Providence  they  trusted  in  was  guiding  their  little  boat,  and 
the  tide  drifted  them  into  quiet  water,  under  the  shelter  of  an  islet  where, 
half-frozen,  they  kindled  a  fire  on  the  shore,  and  outwatched  the  night. 
Time  was  pressing,  and  not  an  hour  was  to  be  lost.  But  it  was  the  '  Christian 
Sabbath,'  and  the  day  was  spent  in  solemn  acts  of  worship  and  thanksgiving 
to  Almighty  God.  The  following  morning  they  landed  at  a  spot  on  the  main- 
land now  known  as  Plymouth,  which  they  so  named,  in  recognition  of  the  kind- 
ness they  had  received  at  the  English  port  from  which  they  had  last  sailed.1 

Landing  at  Plymouth,  December  22,  1620. — On  this  day  the  Mayflo7uer 
was  safely  moored  in  the  quiet  harbor  by  the  immortal  Rock,  whose  name  is 
now  a  charmed  word  in  the  ears  of  millions  of  their  descendants.  In  the 
midst  of  a  blinding  tempest  of  sleet,  rain,  and  snow,  the  fathers  of  New 
England  began  to  swing  their  axes,  every  man  building  a  house  for  himself. 
But  sickness  soon  so  prostrated  the  colonists  that  there  were  scarcely  well 
•ones  enough  to  nurse  the  sick,  or  bury  the  dead.  Soon  after  landing,  Carver 
had  lost  a  son :  before  the  wild  violets  of  spring  had  bloomed  over  his 
grave,  that  great  and  good  man  also  died,  and  his  broken-hearted  wife  soon 
after  joined  him  in  the  better  country. 

1  A  walk  of  somewhat  less  than  two  miles  from  the  the  wide  tract  of  eighty  acres,  which  to  the  strangers' 

JRock  of  Plymouth,  now  brings  the  visitor  to  one  of  the  eye  is  a  vast  labyrinthine  panorama  of  waving  luxuii- 

loveliest  gardens  in  '  the  wide,  wide  world.'     From  the  ance,  where  trees  and  shrubs  and  flowers  of  every  clime 

County  road  out  of  old  Plymouth,  skirted  on   the  left  are  mingled  in  all  the  witchery  of  a  living  mosaic.    This 

with  belts  and  clumps  of  ornamental  shrubs  and  trees  is   'Hillside,'   the  old  Colony  nurseries  of  Mr.   B.  M. 

in  all  stages  of  growth,  the  land  slopes  away  into  a  Watson — names  as  familiarly  known  in  far  off  Japan,  as 

broad    valley  whose  surface  is  completely  hidden  by  to  our  next-door  neighbors  in  St.  Petersburgh,  London 

luxuriant  foliage,  till  reaching  the  junction  of  Rillington  and  Paris. 

Sea  Lane,  glimpses  of  warm  hillsides  and  broad-leaved  What  a  transformation  from  the  Pilgrim  days,  when 
plantations  give  place,  through  a  fine  vista,  to  the  sight  nothing  met  the  eyes  of  the  weary  voyagers,  but  th« 
of  a  home  dwelling  with  its  surrounding  green-houses  dense  frozen  forests,  with  their  towering  pines,  shiver- 
cosily  nestled  in  the  midst  of  a  scene  of  enchantment,  ing  in  the  winter  blast  over  the  same  grounds  ao* 
From  this  commanding  spot  a  complete  view  is  had  of  blushing  in  bewildering  beauty. 


EDWARD  WINSLOTV. 


THE  MAYFLOWER   SAILS  FOR  HOME. 


67 


We  shall  not  rehearse  the  touching  story  of  the  privations  and  sufferings 
of  the  men  and  women  of  Plymouth ;  but  we  shall  let  them  in  their  own  rude 
words,  tell  the  tale  which  has  both  saddened  and  inspired  the  hearts  of  the 
true  and  the  good  all  over  the  world  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years.1 

While  these  stricken  but  undismayed  exiles  were  beginning  to  hew  out  the 
timbers  for  their  rude  dwellings,  and  lay  the  foundations  for  an  enduring  free 
Christian  State,  the  little  May/lower  was  preparing  to  return  to  England.  But 
she  must  go  back  without  the  guardian  angels  who  had  guided  her  first  voy- 
age ;  they  were  to  stay  with  the  colonists.  Her  lessening  sail,  as  it  went  down 
behind  the  last  wave,  was  a  sublimer  sight  than  De  Soto  looked  on  when  he  saw 
his  fleet  disappearing  from  the  Florida  coast.  As  the  saddened  group  gath- 
ered on  the  bleak  shore  at  evening,  to  waft  their  parting  blessings  to  the  soli- 
tary rover  of  the  deep,  clearer  eyes  than  ours  could  see  celestial  sentinels 
standing  guard  by  their  side.2 

In  approaching  this  bleak  spot,  consecrated  by  souvenirs  the  most  sacred 
and  inspiring,  I  feel  like  some  travel-worn  stranger  going  back  to  the  graves 
of  his  fathers.  So,  too,  may  the  myriads  of  their  descendants  feel,  when  in 
fancy  they  gather  around  that  old-colony-cradle  where  the  infancy  of  Ameri- 
can Liberty  was  rocked.  To  them  at  least,  it  will  be  pleasant  to  '  indulge ' 
for  a  little  while  '  in  refreshing  recollections  of  the  past.' 

Prince  gives  a  graphic  picture  of  the  Colony  : — '  Besides  the  natives,  the 
nearest  plantation  to  them  is  a  French  one  at  Port  Royal,  who  have  another 
at  Canada.  The  only  English  ones  are  at  Virginia,  Bermudas,  and  New- 
foundland ;  the  nearest  of  these  about  500  miles  off,  and  every  one  incapable 
of  helping  them ;  wherever  they  turn  their  eyes,  nothing  but  distress  surrounds 
them ;  harassed  for  their  scripture  worship  in  their  native  land,  grieved  for  the 
profanation  of  the  holy  Sabbath  and  other  licentiousness  in  Holland,  fatigued 
with  the  boisterous  voyage,  disappointed  of  their  expected  country,  forced  on 

1  Mrs.  Felicia  Hemans,  at  the  suggestion  of  Edward  Everett,  wrote  that  beautiful  poem,  which,  although 
familiar  to  every  son  of  New  England,  shall  find  its  place  here  : 

The  breaking  waves  dashed  high  The  ocean-eagle  soared 

On  a  stern  and  rock-bound  coast,  From  his  nest  by  the  white  wave's  foam, 

And  the  woods  against  the  stormy  sky  And  the  rocking  pines  of  the  forest  roared— 

Their  giant  branches  tossed.  This  was  their  welcome  home. 


And  the  heavy  night  hung  dark, 

The  hills  and  waters  o'er  ; 
When  a  band  of  exiles  moored  their  bark, 

On  wild  New  England's  shore. 

Not  as  the  conqueror  comes, 

They,  the  true-hearted,  came  ; 
Not  with  the  roll  of  stirring  drum, 

And  the  trumpet  that  sings  of  fame. 

Not  as  the  flying  come, 

In  silence  and  in  fear  : 
They  shook  the  depths  of  the  desert's  gloom 

With  their  hymns  of  lofty  cheer. 

Amid  the  storm  they  sang, 

And  the  stars  heard,  and  the  sea  : 
And  the  sounding  aisles  of  the  deep  woods  rang 

To  the  anthem  of  the  free. 

•  Boughton — the  American  painter — has  portrayed 

the  scene  in  his  noble  picture,  The  Departure  of  the 

Mayflower,  with    great   beauty  and   truth  ;   and  Mr. 

Knoedler,  who  has  done  so  much  for  the  fine  arts  in 


There  were  men  with  hoary  hair 

Amid  that  Pilgrim-band  ; 
Why  had  they  come  to  wither  there, 

Away  from  their  childhood's  land  ? 

There  was  woman's  fearless  eye, 

Lit  by  her  deep  love's  truth  ; 
There  was  manhood's  brow,  serenely  high, 

And  the  fiery  heart  of  youth. 

What  sought  they  thus  afar? 

Bright  jewels  of  the  mine  ? 
The  wealth  of  seas,  the  spoils  of  war  ? 

They  sought  a  Faith's  pure  shrine. 

Aye,  call  it  holy  ground, 

The  soil  where  first  they  trod  ; 
They  have  left  unstained  what  there  they  found — 
Freedom  to  worship  God. 
this  country,  had  it  superbly  engraved  by  an  eminent 
London  artist.  No  picture  can  more  appropriately  adorn 
the  dwelling  of  a  man  who  traces  his  descent  from  tho 
Fathers  of  New  England,  or  venerates  their  memory. 
I 


68  SUFFERINGS  DURING    THE  FIRST  WINTER. 

this  northern  shore  both  utterly  unknown  and  in  the  advance  of  winter;  none 
but  prejudiced  barbarians  round  about  them,  and  without  any  prospect  of  hu- 
man succor ;  without  the  help  or  favor  of  the  Court  of  England,  without  a 
patent,  without  a  public  promise  of  their  religious  liberties,  worn  out  with  toil 
and  sufferings,  without  convenient  shelter  from  the  rigorous  weather;  and  their 
hardships  bringing  a  general  sickness  on  them,  which  reduces  them  to  great 
extremities,  bereaves  them  of  their  dearest  friends,  and  leaves  many  of  the 
children  orphans.  Within  five  months'  time  above  half  their  company  are 
carried  off;  whom  they  account  as  dying  in  this  noble  cause,  whose  memories 
they  consecrate  to  the  dear  esteem  of  their  successors,  and  bear  all  with  a 
Christian  fortitude  and  patience  as  extraordinary  as  their  trials.'*1 

The  darkest  skies  bent  over  these  rude  dwellings;  the  bleakest  winds 
swept  round  them,  during  that  first  dreary  winter.  The  water,  the  earth,  the 
air,  the  trees,  the  rocks  themselves  were  frozen.  Wood-fires,  the  only  com- 
fort that  was  plenty,  blazed  bright,  and  around  the  warm  hearth-stones  the 
prayer  of  thanksgiving  was  said,  and  the  song  of  praise  was  sung.  •  Above  all, 
there  was  freedom  to  worship  God — that  dearest  of  blessings.  Only  half  of 
our  company  had  died  :  the  rest  were  getting  strong.  God  was  nearer  to  us 
than  He  ever  had  been  in  dear  old  England.  He  had  planted  His  vine  in 
the  wilderness,  and  the  vine  of  His  planting  would  grow — what  more  could  we 
ask  ? '     It  was  all  told  in  these  simple,  sublime  words. 

We  will  look  at  the  life  they  led  this  first  winter,  as  painted  by  themselves. 
It  is  the  literal  record,  arranged  in  chronological  order  by  Prince,9  from 
Mourt's  Relation,  Winslow's  Relation,  Purchas's  Pilgrims,  Smith's  History, 
Johnson's  History,  Sir  F.  Gorge's,  Morton's  Memorial,  Governor  Bradford's 
History  and  Register,  and  the  Massachusetts  Colonial  Records.  The  words 
are  as  brief  as  monumental  inscriptions,  and  more  significant : 

1620.  Nov.  9. — At  break  of  day,  after  long  beating  the  sea,  they  make  the  land  of  Cape  Cod,  whereupon 
they  tack,  and  stand  to  the  southward,  the  wind  and  weather  being  fair,  to  find  some  place  about  Hudson  River, 
for  setdement.  But  sailing  this  course  about  half  a  day,  they  fall  among  roaring  shoals  and  breakers,  and  are  so 
entangled  with  them  as  they  find  themselves  in  great  hazard  ;  and  the  wind  shrinking  upon  them  at  the  same 

1  Chronological  His.  of  New  England,  pp.  129-30.  and  magistrates,  our  good  government  and  order,  the 

a  Of  the  Rev.  Thomas  Prince,  the  author  of  the  in-  public  restraints  of  vice,  the  general  knowledge  of  our 

valuable   Chronological  History  of  New  England,  common  people,  the  strict  observation  of  the  Christian 

the   New  England   Biographical   Dictionary   says  : —  Sabbath  ;  with  those  remains  of  public  modesty,  sobri- 

'  He  was  one  of  the  most  learned  and   useful  men  of  ety,  social  virtues  and  religion  for  which  this  country  is 

his  age.     He  would  deserve  this  character,  if  he  had  distinguished  among  the  British  colonies,  and  in  which 

never  published  anything  but  this  Chronology.'    He  was  we  are  as  happy  as  any  on  earth. 

for  forty  years  pastor  of  the  Old  South  Church,  in  Bos-  August  5,  1614. — Captain   John  Smith  puts  in  at 

ton,  and  died  m  1758.     In  speaking  of  the  settlers  of  Plymouth,  and  in  the  end  of  the  month  arrives  at  Lon- 

the  two  first  and  principal  colonies,  that  of  Plymouth,  don,  draws  a  plat  of  the  country,  and  first  calls  it  New 

and  the  Massachusetts,  from  whence  the  others  were  England.     After  Smith  left  New  England,  Hunt  gets 

originally  derived,  Prince  says  :—  _  twenty  Indians  aboard  him  at  Pawtuxet,  one  of  whom 

It  was  for  their  great  concern  that  the  same  vital  and  is  called  Squanto,  or  Squantum,  or  Tesquantum  ;  and 
pure  Christianity  and  liberty,  both  civil  and  ecclesiasti-  seven  more  at  Nausit,  and  carries  them  to  Malaga  and 
cal,  might  be  continued  to  their  successors,  for  which  sells  them  for  slaves,  for  twenty  pounds  per  man,  which 
they  left  their  own  and  their  fathers'  houses  in  the  most  raises  such  an  enmity  against  our  nation  as  makes  fur- 
pleasant  places  then  on  earth,  with  many  of  their  dear-  ther  attempts  of  commerce  with  them  very  dangerous. — 
est  relatives,  and  came  over  the  ocean  into  this  then  Prince's  New  England  Chronology,  p.  132. 
hideous  wilderness  ;  and  the  peaceful  fruits  of  whose  1617.— This  winter  and  the  spring  ensuing,  a  great 
extraordinary  cares,  labors,  hardships,  wisdom,  cour-  plague  befalls  the  natives  in  New  England,  which 
age,  passions,  blood,  and  death,  we,  under  the  divine  wasteth  them  exceedingly,  and  so  many  thousands  of 
protection  and  justice  of  the  best  of  Kings,  enjoy.  them  die  that  the  living  are  not  able  to  bury  them,  and 

It  is  to  these  we  firstly  owe  our  pleasant  houses,  our  their  skulls  and  bones  remain  above  ground,  at  th« 

fruitful  fields,   our  growing  towns  and  churches,  our  places  of  their  habitations,  for  several  years  after. — P 

wholesome  laws,  our  precious  privileges,  our  grammar-  138. 
'  s  and  colleges,  our  pious  and  learned   ministers 


THE  MAYFLOWER   ON  THE   COAST.  69 

lime,  they  bear  up  for  the  Cape ;  get  out  of  those  dangers  before  night,  and  the  next  day  into  the  Cape  harbor, 
where  they  ride  in  safety. 

Nov.  11,  Saturday. — Being  thus  arrived,  they  first  fall  on  their  knees  and  bless  the  God  of  Heaven  ;  but 
their  design  and  patent  being  for  Virginia,  and  not  New  England,  which  belongs  to  another  jurisdiction,  where- 
with the  Virginia  company  have  no  concern,  before  they  land,  they  this  day  combine  into  a  body  politic,  by  a 
solemn  contract,  to  which  they  set  their  hands,  as  the  basis  of  their  government  in  this  new-found  country ; 
choose  Mr.  John  Carver,  a  pious  and  well-approved  gentleman,  their  governor  for  the  first  year,  and  then  set 
ashore  fifteen  or  sixteen  men,  well  armed,  to  fetch  wood  and  discover  the  land,  who  at  night  return,  but  find 
neither  house  nor  person. 

Nov.  13,  Monday. — The  people  go  ashore  to  refresh  themselves,  and  every  day  the  whales  play  round 
about  them,  and  the  greatest  store  of  fowl  they  ever  saw.  But  the  earth  here,  a  company  of  long  sand  hills 
and  the  water  so  shallow  near  the  shore,  they  are  forced  to  wade  a  bow-shot  or  two  to  get  to  land,  which,  being 
freezing  weather,  affecteth  them  with  grievous  colds  and  coughs,  which  after  proves  the  death  of  many,  and 
renders  the  place  unfit  for  settlement 

Nov.  15. — While  the  shallop  is  fitting,  Capt.Standish,with  sixteen  men,  well  armed,  sets  out  on  the  Cape,  to 
search  for  a  convenient  place  to  settle.  William  Bradford,  Stephen  Hopkins,  and  Edward  Tilly,  are  of  the  number 
adjoined  to  the  captain  for  counsel.  When  they  had  marched  a  mile  southward,  they  see  five  or  six  savages, 
whom  they  follow  ten  miles,  till  night,  but  could  not  overtake  them  ;  and  lodge  in  the  woods.  The  next  day  they 
head  a  great  creek,  and  travel  on  to  a  valley,  wherein  is  a  fine  clear  pond  of  fresh  water,  a  musket  shot  wide, 
and  two  long.  Then  they  come  to  a  place  of  graves.  *  *  They  meet  with  heaps  of  sand,  dig  into  them,  find 
several  baskets  full  of  Indian  corn,  and  taking  some,  for  which  they  purpose  to  give  the  Indians  full  satisfaction 
as  soon  as  they  could  meet  with  any  of  them,  return  to  the  pond,  where  they  make  a  barricade  and  lodge  this 
night,  being  very  rainy  ;  and  the  next  day  wading  in  some  places  up  to  the  knees,  get  back  to  the  ship,  to  the 
great  joy  of  their  brethren. 

Nov.  27. — The  shallop  being  fitted,  twenty-four  of  their  men,  with  Mr.  Jones  and  nine  sailors,  thirty-four  in 
all,  set  forth  on  a  more  full  discovery  of  the  aforesaid  harbor.  But  the  weather  growing  rough,  and  the  winds 
cross,  they  are  soon  obliged  to  row  for  the  nearest  shore,  and  then  wade  above  their  knees  to  land  ;  it  blows, 
snows,  and  freezes  all  this  day  and  night ;  and  here  some  receive  the  seeds  of  those  fatal  illnesses  that  quickly 
seized  them.  The  next  day  they  sail  to  their  designed  port,  but  find  it  unfit  for  shipping  ;  land  between  two 
creeks,  and  marching  four  or  five  miles  by  the  greater,  are  tired  with  travelling  up  and  down  the  steep  hills  and 
valleys  covered  half  a  foot  with  snow,  and  lodge  under  pine  trees.  The  next  morning,  return  to  the  other  creek, 
and  thus  to  the  place  of  their  former  digging,  where  they  dig  again,  though  the  ground  be  frozen  a  foot  deep, 
and  find  more  corn,  and  beans ;  make  up  their  corn  to  ten  bushels,  which  they  send  with  Mr.  Jones,  and  fifteen 
of  their  sick  and  weaker  people,  to  the  ship,  eighteen  staying  and  lodging  there  this  night  Next  day  they  dig 
in  several  such  like  places,  but  find  no  more  corn,  nor  anything  else  but  graves.  Discover  two  Indian  wigwams, 
but  see  no  natives  ;  and  the  shallop  returning,  they  get  aboard  at  night,  and  the  next  day,  December  ist,  re- 
turn to  the  ship.  The  corn  they  found  happily  served  for  their  planting  on  the  spring  ensuing,  or  they  would 
have  been  in  great  danger  of  perishing,  for  which  they  gave  the  owners  entire  content  about  six  months  after. 
Before  the  end  of  November  ensuing,  Susanna,  wife  of  William  White,  was  delivered  of  a  son,  who  is  called 
Peregrine  [he  lives  to  July  22,  1704,  when  he  dies  at  Marshfield],  being  the  first-born  since  their  arrival,  and  I 
conclude  the  first  of  the  European  extract  in  New  England. 

Dec.  4.— Dies  Edward  Thomson,  servant  of  William  White,  the  first  that  dies  since  their  arrival.  Dec.  ft 
Dies  Jasper,  a  boy  of  Mr.  Carver's.     Dec.  7.  Dorothy,  wife  of  William  Bradford.     Dec.  8.  James  Chilton. 

Dec.  6. — They  again  send  out  their  shallop,  with  ten  of  their  principal  men,  viz.  :  Mr.  Carver,  Bradford, 
Winslow,  Capt  Standish,  with  eight  or  ten  seamen,  to  ciruclate  the  Bay  and  find  a  better  place  :  though  the 
weather  is  very  cold,  and  the  spray  of  the  sea  freezes  on  them,  that  their  clothes  look  as  if  they  were  glazed,  and 
feel  like  coats  of  iron.  This  night  they  get  to  the  bottom  of  the  Bay,  see  ten  or  twelve  Indians  ashore  busy  a 
cutting  up  a  grampus.  By  reason  of  the  flats,  they  land  with  great  difficulty,  make  a  barricade,  lodge  therein, 
and  see  the  smoke  of  the  Indian  fires  that  night,  about  four  or  five  miles  from  them. 

Dec.  7. — This  morning  they  divide  their  company,  some  travelling  on  shore,  eight  others  coasting  in  the  shal- 
lop, by  great  flats  of  sand.  About  ten  o'clock  the  shore  people  find  a  great  burying-place,  part  thereof  encom- 
passed by  a  large  Pallizado  full  of  graves,  some  poled  about,  others  having  small  poles  turned  and  twisted  over 
them.     Without  the  Pallizado  were  graves  also,  but  not  so  cosdy. 

Dec.  8. — At  five  this  morning  they  rise,  and  after  prayer  the  day  dawning,  and  the  tide  high  enough  to  call 
them  down  to  the  shallop,  they  suddenly  hear  a  great  and  strange  cry,  one  of  their  company  running  towards 
them,  calling  out,  'Indians!  Indians!'  Therewith,  arrows  come  flying  about  them.  Upon  discharging  their 
pieces,  the  Indians  soon  get  away.  *  *  And  not  one  of  the  company  wounded,  though  the  arrows  flew  close  on 
every  side,  upon  which  they  gave  God  solemn  thanks  ;  then  sailed  along  the  coast  about  fifteen  leagues  ;  find 
no  convenient  harbor,  and  hasten  on  to  a  port  which  Mr.  Coppin,  their  pilot,  assures  them  is  a  good  one,  which 
he  had  been  in,  and  they  might  reach  before  night  But  after  some  hours'  sa ding,  it  begins  to  snow  and  rain  ; 
it  mid-afternoon  the  wind  rising,  the  sea  grows  very  rough  ;  they  break  their  rudder ;  it  is  as  much  as  two  men 
"an  steer  her  with  a  couple  of  oars,  and  the  storm  increasing,  the  night  approaching,  and  bearing  what  sail 
hey  can  to  get  in,  they  break  their  mast  in  three  pieces,  their  sail  falls  overboard  into  a  very  grown  sea  ;  they 


70  THE  RECORDS  OF   THE  PILGRIMS. 

are  like  to  founder  suddenly.  Yet  by  the  mercy  of  heaven  they  recovered  themsehes,  and  the  flood  bei  g  witk 
them,  strike  into  the  imagined  harbor,  but  the  pilot  being  deceived,  cries  out,—'  Lord  be  merciful !— my  eyes 
never  saw  this  place  before  ! '  and  he  and  the  mate  would  have  run  her  ashore  in  a  cove  full  of  breakers,  before 
the  wind,  but  a  seaman  calling  to  the  rowers,— '  About  with  her,  or  we  are  cast  away  ! '  they  get  under  the  lee 
of  a  small  rise  of  land  ;  but  they  are  divided  about  going  ashore,  lest  they  fall  into  the  midst  of  savages.  Some 
therefore  keep  the  boat ;  but  others  being  so  wet,  cold,  and  feeble,  cannot  bear  it,  but  venture  ashore,  and  with 
great  difficulty  kindle  a  fire  ;  and  after  midnight  the  wind  shifting  to  the  north-west  and  freezing  hard,  the  rest 
are  glad  to  get  to  them  and  here  staid  the  night. 

Dec.  9.— In  the  morning  they  find  the  place  to  be  a  small  island  secure  from  Indians,  and  this  being  the  last 
day  of  the  week,  they  here  dry  their  stuff,  fix  their  pieces,  rest  themselves,  return  God  thanks  for  their  many  de- 
liverances ;  and  here  the  next  day  keep  their  Christian  Sabbath. 

December  11,  Monday.— They  sound  the  harbor,  find  it  fit  for  shipping,  march  into  the  land,  see  diverse 
cornfields,  and  running  brooks,  with  a  place  they  judge  to  be  fit  for  habitation,  and  return  to  the  ship  with  the 
discovery,  to  their  great  comfort. 

Dec.  15.— The  ship  sails  for  this  new  found  port,  gets  within  two  leagues  of  it,  when  a  north-west  wind 
springs  up  and  forces  her  back  ;  but  the  next  day  the  wind  comes  fair,  and  she  arrives  in  the  desired  harbor. 
Quickly  after,  the  wind  chops  about,  so  that,  had  they  been  hindered  but  half  an  hour,  they  would  have  been 
forced  back  to  the  Cape. 

Dec.  18,  Monday.— -They  land  with  the  master  of  the  ship,  and  three  or  four  sailors,  march  along  the  coast 
seven  or  eight  miles,  but  see  neither  wigwam  of  Indians  nor  navigable  river,  but  only  four  or  five  brooks  of  sweet 
fresh  water  running  into  the  sea,  with  choice  ground  formerly  possessed  and  planted,  and  at  night  return  to  the 
ship.  Next  day  they  go  again  to  discover,  some  on  land,  others  in  the  shallop  ;  find  a  creek  into  which  they  pass 
three  miles  and  return. 

Dec.  20. — This  morning,  after  calling  to  heaven  for  guidance,  they  go  ashore  again  to  pitch  on 

SOME  PLACE  FOR  IMMEDIATE  SETTLEMENT.  AFTER  VIEWING  THE  COUNTRY,  THEY  CONCLUDE  TO  SETTLE  ON  TUB 
MAIN,  ON  A  HIGH  GROUND  FACING  THE  BAY,  WHERE  CORN  HAD  BEEN  PLANTED  THREE  OR  FOUR  YEARS  BEFORE  ;  A 
SWEET  BROOK  RUNNING  UNDER  THE  HILL,  WITH  MANY  DELICATE  SPRINGS.  On  A  GREAT  HILL  THEY  INTEND  TO 
FORTIFY,  WHICH  WILL  COMMAND  ALL  AROUND,  WHENCE  THEV  MAY  SEE  ACROSS  THE  BAY  TO  THE  CAPE.  And 
HERE,  BEING  IN  NUMBER  TWENTY,  THEY  RENDEZVOUS  THIS  EVENING  ;  BUT  A  STORM  RISING,  IT  BLOWS  AND  RAINS 
HARD  ALL  NIGHT,  AND  CONTINUES  SO  TEMPESTUOUS  FOR  TWO  DAYS  THAT  THEY  CANNOT  GET  ABOARD,  AND  HAVE 
NOTHING  TO  SHELTER  THEM. 

Dec.  21. — Dies  Richard  Britteridge,  the  first  who  dies  in  this  harbor. 

Dec.  23,  Saturday. — As  many  as  can,  go  ashore,  cut  and  carry  timber  for  a  common  building. 

Dec.  24,  Lord's  Day. — Our  people  ashore  are  alarmed  with  the  cry  of  '  Savages  !'  expect  an  assault,  but 
continue  quiet.     And  this  day  dies  Solomon  Martin,  the  sixth  and  last  who  dies  this  month. 

Dec.  25,  Monday. — They  go  ashore  again,  felling  timber,  sawing,  riving,  carrying.  Begin  to  erect  the  first 
house,  about  twenty  foot  square,  for  their  common  use,  to  receive  them  and  their  goods,  and  leaving  twenty  to 
keep  a  court  of  guard,  the  rest  return  aboard  at  evening  ;  but  in  the  night  and  next  day  another  sore  storm  and 
wind  and  rain. 

Dec.  28,  Thursday. — They  go  to  work  on  the  hill,  reduce  themselves  to  nineteen  families,  measure  out  their 
lots,  and  draw  for  them.  Many  grow  ill  of  grievous  colds,  from  the  great  and  many  hardships  they  had  endured. 
Dec.  29,  30,  very  cold  and  stormy  again,  and  they  see  great  smokes  of  fires  made  by  Indians,  about  six  or  seven 
miles  off. 

Dec.  31,  Lord's  Day. — Though  the  generality  remain  aboard  the  ship,  almost  a  mile  and  a  half  off,  yet  this 
seems  to  be  the  first  day  that  any  keep  the  Sabbath  in  the  place  of  their  building.  At  this  time  we  therefore  fix 
the  era  of  their  settlement  here,  to  which  they  give  the  name  of  Plymouth,  the  first  English  town  in  this  coun- 
try, in  a  grateful  memory  of  the  Christian  friends  they  found  at  Plymouth  in  England,  as  of  the  last  town  they 
left  in  that  their  native  land.  . 

January  1,  1621.  Monday.— The  people  at  Plymouth  go  betimes  to  work,  and  the  year  begins  with  the 
death  of  Degory  Priest 

Jan.  2. — Some  abroad  see  great  fires  of  Indians,  and  go  to  their  cornfields,  but  discover  none  of  the  sav- 
ages, nor  have  seen  any  since  we  came  to  this  harbor.  ■ 

Jan.  4.— Capt.  Standish,  with  four  or  five  more,  go  to  look  for  the  natives,  where  their  fires  were  made  ; 
find  some  of  their  houses,  though  not  lately  inhabited,  but  none  of  the  natives. 

Jan.  9. — We  labor  in  building  our  town  in  two  rows  of  houses,  for  greater  safety  ;  divide  by  lot  the  ground 
we  build  on  :  agree  that  every  man  shall  build  his  own  house. 

Jan.  13.— Having  the  major  part  of  our  people  ashore,  we  purpose  there  to  keep  the  public  worship  to-mor- 
row. 

Jan.  14.— Lord's  Day  morning  at  six  o'clock,  the  wind  being  very  high,  we  on  shipboard  see  our  rendez- 
vous in  flames.  *  *  It  was  fired  by  a  spark  flying  into  the  thatch,  which  instandy  burned  it  up.  The  greater! 
sufferers  are  Governor  Carver  and  Mr.  Bradford. 


V.TXSLOW'S  VISIT  TO  1IASSAS0IT. 


THE  FIRST  DREADFUL    WINTER   AT  PLYMOUTH.  1\ 

yan.  21. — We  keep  our  public  worship  ashore. 

Jan.  29.— Dies  Rose,  the  wife  of  Captain  Standish. 

yan.  31. — This  morning  the  people  aboard  the  ship  see  two  savages,  the  first  that  we  see  at  this  hirboi, 
but  cannot  speak  with  them.     N.B.  This  month  eight  of  our  number  die. 

Feb.  9. — This  afternoon  our  house  for  our  sick  people  is  set  afire  by  a  spark  lighting  on  the  roof. 

Feb.  16. — One  of  our  people  a  fowling  by  a  creek  about  a  mile  and  a  half  off,  twelve  Indians  march  by  him 
towards  the  town.  In  the  woods  he  hears  the  noise  of  many  more,  lies  close  till  they  are  passed  by,  then  hastens 
home  and  gives  the  alarm  ;  so  the  people  abroad  return,  but  see  none  ;  only  Capt.  Standish  and  Francis  Cook, 
leaving  their  tools  in  the  woods,  and  going  for  them,  find  the  savages  had  took  them  away  ;  and  towards  night 
a  great  fire  about  the  place  where  the  man  saw  them. 

Feb.  17. — This  morning  we  first  meet  for  appointing  military  orders,  choose  Miles  Standish  for  our  captain, 
give  him  power  accordingly,  and  while  we  are  consulting,  two  savages  present  themselves  on  the  top  of  the  hill, 
over  against  us,  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  off,  making  signs  for  us  to  come  to  them.  We  send  Captain  Standish 
and  Mr.  Hopkins  over  the  brook  towards  them,  one  only  with  a  musket,  which  he  lays  down  in  sign  of  peace 
and  parley.  But  the  Indians  would  not  stay  their  coming  ;  the  noise  of  a  great  many  more  is  heard  behind  the 
hill,  but  no  more  come  in  sight. 

Feb.  21. — Die,  Mr.  William  White,  Mr.  William  Mullins,  with  two  more,  and  the  25th  dies  Mary,  the  wife 
of  Mr.  Isaac  Allerton.     N.B.  This  month  seventeen  of  our  number  die. 

This  spring  there  go  ten  or  twelve  ships  from  the  west  of  England  to  fish  on  the  north-eastern  coast  of  New 
England  ;  who  get  well  freighted  with  fish  and  fur. 

About  this  time  the  Indians  get  all  the  Pawaws  of  the  country,  for  three  days  together,  in  a  horrid  and 
devilish  manner,  to  curse  and  execrate  us  with  their  conjurations ;  which  assembly  they  hold  in  a  dark  and  dis- 
mal swamp,  as  we  are  afterwards  informed. 

March  7. — The  Governor  with  five  more  go  to  the  great  ponds  ;  and  we  begin  to  sow  our  garden  seeds. 

March  16. — This  morning  a  savage  boldly  comes  alone  along  the  houses,  straight  to  the  rendezvous,  surprises 
us  with  calling  out  '  Welcome  Englishmen  !  Welcome  Englishmen  ! '  having  learned  some  broken  English  among 
the  fishermen  at  Monhiggon  ;  the  first  Indian  we  met  with,  his  name  Samoset,  says  he  is  a  Sagamore,  or 
lord  of  Moratiggon,  lying  hence  a  day's  sail  with  a  great  wind,  and  five  days  by  land,  and  has  been  in  these 
parts  eight  months.  We  entertain  him,  and  he  informs  us  about  the  country  :  that  the  place  we  are  in  is  called 
Patuxet ;  that  about  four  years  ago  all  the  inhabitants  died  of  an  extraordinary  plague,  and  there  is  neither 
man,  woman  nor  child  remaining  ;  as  indeed  we  find  none  to  hinder  our  possession,  or  lay  claim  to  it.  At  night 
we  lodge  and  watch  him. 

March  17. — This  morning  we  send  Samoset  to  the  Masassoits,  our  next  neighbors,  whence  he  came.  TI.e 
Nausites  near  south-east  of  us  being  those  by  whom  we  were  first  encountered,  as  before  related,  are  much 
incensed  against  the  English  ;  about  eight  months  ago  slew  three  Englishmen,  and  two  more  hardly  escaped  to 
Monhiggon  ;  they  were  Sir  F.  Gorges'  men,  as  our  savage  tells  us.  He  also  tells  us  of  the  fight  we  had  with  the 
Nausites,  and  of  our  tools  lately  taken  away,  which  we  required  him  to  bring.     This  people  are  ill  affected 

TO   US   BECAUSE   OF   HUNT,  WHO   CARRIED  AWAY   TWENTY   FROM   THIS   PLACE   WE   NOW   INHABIT,    AND   SEVEN   OF 

the  Nausites,  as  before  observed.  He  promised  within  a  night  or  two  to  bring  some  of  the  Masassoits, 
with  beaver  skins,  to  trade. 

March  18.— Samoset  returns  with  five  other  men,  who  bring  our  tools,  with  some  skins,  and  make  shew  of 
friendship  ;  but,  being  the  Lord's  Day,  we  would  not  trade,  but  entertaining  them,  bid  them  come  again  and 
bring  more  ;  which  they  promised  within  a  night  or  two.     But  Samoset  tarries  with  us. 

March  21. — This  morning,  the  Indians  not  coming,  we  send  Samoset  to  inquire  the  reason.  In  his  absence, 
two  or  three  savages  present  themselves  on  the  top  of  the  hill  against  us,  with  a  shew  of  daring  us  ;  but  Captain 
Standish  and  another  going  over,  the  Indians  whet  their  arrows  and  make  shew  of  defiance  ;  but  as  our  men 
advance,  they  run  away. 

March  22. — About  noon  Samoset  returns  with  Squanto,  the  only  native  of  this  place,  one  of  the  twenty 
Hunt  had  carried  to  Spain,  but  got  into  England,  lived  in  Cornhill,  London,  with  Mr.  John  Slanie,  and 
can  speak  a  little  English,  with  three  others  ;  bring  a  few  skins,  and  signify  that  their  great  Sagamore,  Masas- 
soit,  the  greatest  king  of  the  Indians  bordering  on  us,  is  hard  by,  with  his  brother  Quadequina,  and  their  com- 
pany. After  an  hour,  the  king  comes  to  the  top  of  an  hill  over  against  us,  with  a  train  of  sixty  men.  We  send 
Squanto  to  him,  who  brings  word  that  we  would  send  one  to  parley  with  him.  We  send  Mr.  Edward  Win- 
slow  TO  KNOW  HIS  MIND,  AND  SIGNIFY  THAT  OUR  GOVERNOR  DESIRES  TO  SEE  HIM,  AND  TRUCK  AND  CON- 
FIRM a  peace.  Upon  this  the  king  leaves  Mr.  Winslow  in  the  custody  of  Quadequina,  and  comes  over  the 
brook  with  a  train  of  twenty  men,  leaving  their  bows  and  arrows  behind  them.  Capt.  Standish  and 
master  Williamson,  with  six  musketeers,  meet  him  at  the  brook,  where  they  salute  each  other,  conduct  him  to  a 
house,  wherein  they  place  a  green  rug  and  three  or  four  cushions  ;  then  instantly  comes  our  governor,  with  drum, 
trumpet  and  musketeers.  After  salutations,  the  governor  kissing  his  hand,  and  the  king  kissing  him,  they  set 
down,  the  governor  entertains  him  with  some  refreshments,  and  then  they  agree  on  a  league  of  friend- 
JUip,  as  follows  : 

1.  That  neither  he  nor  his  should  injure  any  of  ours. 


72  FIRST  PILGRIM  TREATY   WITH  THE  INDIANS. 

a.  That  if  they  did,  he  should  send  the  offender,  that  we  might  punish  him. 

3.  That  if  our  tools  were  taken  away,  he  should  restore  them  ;  and  if  ours  did  any  hark 
to  any  of  his,  we  would  do  the  like  to  them. 

4.  if  any  unjustly  warred  against  him,  we  would  aid  him  ;  and  if  any  warred  against  us,  he 
should  aid  us. 

5.  he  should  certify  his  neighbor  confederates  of  this,  that  they  might  not  wrong  us,  but 
be  comprised  in  the  conditions  of  peace. 

6.  That  when  their  men  come  to  us,  thky  should  leave  their  bows  and  arrows  behind  them, 
as  we  should  leave  our  pieces  when  we  come  to  them. 

7.  That  doing  this,  King  James  would  esteem  him  as  his  friend  and  ally. 

This  was  the  first  display  of  humanity  and  justice  towards  the  natives,  on 
the  part  of  any  of  the  Europeans  who  had  appeared  on  the  American  coast, 
and  it  bore  its  legitimate  and  beneficent  fruits.  More  than  half  a  century 
went  by  before  this  solemn  treaty  was  violated  on  either  side ;  nor  would  it 
then  have  been  broken,  had  it  not  been  for  the  intervention  of  other  parties, 
for  whose  acts  neither  side  was  responsible.  After  the  treaty  had  been  rati- 
fied, the  record  continues  :- 

The  governor  conducts  him  to  the  brook,  where  they  embrace  and  part ;  we  keeping  six  or  seven  hostages  fof 
our  messenger.  But  Quadequina  coming  with  his  troop,  we  entertain  and  convey  him  back,  receive  our  messen- 
ger, and  return  the  hostages.  *  *  The  king  is  a  pordy  man,  in  his  best  years,  grave  of  countenance,  spare  of 
speech.  And  we  cannot  but  judge  he  is  willing  to  be  at  peace  with  us,  especially  because  he  has  a  potent  ad- 
versary the  Narragansetts,  who  are  at  war  with  him,  against  whom  he  thinks  we  may  be  some  strength,  our 
pieces  being  terrible  to  them.     But  Samoset  and  Squanto  tarry. 

This  day  we  meet  on  common  business,  conclude  our  military  orders,  with  some  laws  convenient  for  our 
present  state,  and  choose,  or  rather  confirm  Mr.  Carver  our  governor  for  the  following  year. 

March  24. — Dies  Elizabeth,  the  wife  of  Mr.  Edward  Winslow. 

This  month  thirteen  of  our  number  die.  And  in  the  three  months  past  dies  half  our  company  ; 
the  greatest  part  in  the  depth  of  winter,  wanting  houses  and  other  comforts,  being  infected 
with  the  scurvy  and  other  diseases,  which  their  long  voyage  and  unaccommodate  condition  brought 
upon  them  j  so  as  there  die  sometimes  two  or  three  a  day,  of  ioo  persons  scarce  fifty  remain  ;  the 
living  scarce  able  to  bury  the  dead,  the  well  not  sufficient  to  attend  the  sick  j  there  being  in 
their  time  of  greatest  distress  but  six  or  seven,  who  spared  no  pains  to  help  them.    two  of  the 

SEVEN  WERE  Mr.   BREWSTER,  THE  REVEREND  ELDER,  AND  Mr.   STANDISH,  THEIR  CAPTAIN. 

But  the  spring  advancing,  it  pleases  God  the  mortality  begins  to  cease,  and  the  sick  and  lame  recover,  which 
puts  new  life  into  the  people,  though  they  had  borne  their  sad  affliction  with  as  much  patience  as  any  could  do. 

April  5. — After  this  we  plant  twenty  acres  of  Indian  corn,  wherein  Squanto  is  a  great  help,  showing  us  how* 
to  set,  fish,  dress  and  tend  it,  of  which  we  have  a  good  increase. 

While  we  are  busy  about  our  seed,  our  governor,  Mr.  Carver,  comes  out  of  the  field  very  sick,  complains 
greatly  of  his  head  ;  within  a  few  hours  his  senses  fail,  so  as  he  speaks  no  more  ;  and  in  a  few  days  after 
he  dies,  to  our  great  lamentation  and  heaviness.  His  care  and  pains  were  so  great  for  the  common 
good  as  therewith  it  is  thought  he  oppressed  himself  and  shortened  his  days ;  of  whose  loss  we  cannot  suf- 
ficiently complain  ;  and  his  wife  deceases  about  five  or  six  weeks  after. 

Soon  after  we  choose  Mr.  William  Bradford  our  governor,  and  Mr.  Isaac  Allerton  his  assistant,  who  are  by 
renewed  elections  continued  together  sundry  years. 

The  second  offence  is  the  first  duel  fought  in  New  England,  upon  a  challenge  of  single  combat,  with  sword 
and  dagger,  between  Edward  Doty  and  Edward  Leister,  servants  of  Mr.  Hopkins,  both  being  wounded,  the 
»ne  in  the  hand,  the  other  in  the  thigh.  They  are  adjudged  by  the  whole  company  to  have  their  head  and 
feet  tied  together  and  so  to  lie  for  twenty-four  hours,  without  meat  or  drink  ;  which  is  begun  to  be  inflicted  ;  but 
within  an  hour,  because  of  their  great  pains,  at  their  own  and  their  master's  humble  request,  upon  promise  ol 
better  carriage,  they  are  released  by  the  governor. 

July  2. — We  agree  to  send  Mr.  Edward  Winslow,  and  Mr.  Stephen  Hopkins,  with  Squanto,  to  see  our 
new  friend  Masassoit  at  Pakanokit,  to  bestow  some  gratuities  on  him,  bind  him  faster  to  us,  view  the  country, 
»ee  how  and  where  he  lives,  his  strength,  etc. 

We  can  now  afford  to  leave  the  Plymouth  colony  for  a  while,  assured  that 
its  councils  are  to  be  guided  by  wisdom,  and  that  it  will  be  blessed  by  the 
favor  of  heaven,  while  we  greet  Henry  Hudson's  yacht,  which  had  long  be- 
fore been  approaching  the  waters  of  New  York. 


ORIGIN  OF    THE   COLONY  OF  NEW  NETHERLAND.        73 

In  our  early  history,  European  events  sometimes  affected  us  quite  as 
seriously  as  they  ever  have  since.  The  colonization  of  New  England,  which 
had  its  first  important  beginning  with  the  Pilgrims,  grew  out  of  the  strifes 
between  the  hierarchy  of  the  Anglican  Church  and  the  English  dissenters. 
No  sooner  had  the  Reformation  emancipated  the  Netherlands  than  the  Dutch 
settlements  on  the  Hudson  began,  and  the  principle  of  popular  representation 
for  federal  legislation  carried  out  by  the  Dutch  Republic,  served  as  a  model 
for  the  first  confederation  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies  which  afterwards  crystal- 
lized into  the  Constitution  of  1789,  which  consolidated  the  Republic  of  the 
United  States  of  America. 

The  Colonization  of  New  Netherland. — It  forms  nearly  as  attractive  a  sub- 
ject as  that  of  Virginia  or  New  England.  The  immediate  consequences  were 
indeed  by  no  means  so  great,  nor  were  the  Dutch  colonists  to  have  so  con- 
trolling an  influence  over  the  political  institutions  of  the  country.  But  many 
noble  characters  appear  in  the  records  of  those  times,  and  their  descendants 
may  well  be  proud  of  their  Dutch  ancestry.  The  Republic  of  the  United 
Netherlands  has  formed  the  theme  of  one  of  the  most  fascinating  and  useful 
histories  written  in  recent  days.  The  attempt  of  Philip  II.  to  crush  out  the 
last  vestige  of  ancient  municipal  liberty  in  the  Low  Countries,  led  to  one  of 
the  most  memorable  struggles  known  in  the  history  of  the  world.  There  is, 
in  fact,  no  page  in  the  records  of  tyranny,  bigotry,  and  remorseless  cruelty, 
that  equals  the  story  of  the  Netherlands ;  while  the  valor  and  devotion  to 
liberty  displayed  by  the  mass  of  the  people,  the  rich  burghers,  and  the  nobility 
headed  by  Egmond  and  Horn,  scarcely  found  a  parallel  even  in  the  courage 
and  endurance  of  our  fathers.  Indeed,  the  spirit  of  independence  which  in- 
spired the  colony  of  New  Netherland,  and  which  the  sturdy  Dutch  settlers 
and  their  children  displayed  all  through  to  the  close  of  the  Revolution,  was 
but  a  continuation  of  the  stream  that,  flowing  from  the  fountain  of  the  Dutch 
Republic,  reached  these  shores.  When  the  confederation  of  the  Low  Coun- 
tries took  place, — just  two  hundred  years  before  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill, — 
nearly  all  those  provinces  had  united  in  driving  the  armies  of  Philip  from  their 
soil.  Of  their  unparalleled  devotion  to  liberty  and  independence,  the  great 
Sidney,  in  writing  to  Queen  Elizabeth,  said, — '  The  spirit  that  animates  them 
is  the  spirit  of  God,  and  is  invincible.' 

Of  the  wealth  and  extent  of  the  commerce  of  the  Dutch  Republic,  we 
commonly  have  but  a  faint  conception.  Its  genius  was  well  portrayed  on  its 
coin,  which  bore  the  image  of  a  sailless  and  oarless  ship  struggling  in  the 
waves.  The  Provinces  of  Holland  and  Zealand, — the  two  largest  members 
of  the  Dutch  confederacy, — consisted  chiefly  in  flat  lands,  bathed  on  all  sides 
by  salt  water.  If  tne  '  home  of  Britain '  was  by  fair  poetical  license  said  to  be 
1  on  the  deep,'  the  people  of  the  Low  Countries  may  be  said  to  have  been 
Dorn  on  the  water,  and  like  ducks  they  took  to  it  as  their  native  element. 
Amsterdam  became   the  first  commercial  city  of  the  world ;  ■  the  Tyre  of 


74        POWER  AND    WEALTH   OF   THE  DUTCH  REPUBLIC. 

modern  times,  the  Venice  of  the  north  ;  the  Queen  of  all  the  seas.'  Raleigr 
wrote  that  *  the  ships  of  the  Dutch  outnumbered  those  of  England,  and  ten 
other  kingdoms.'  The  flag  of  the  Dutch  Republic  was  on  every  ocean. 
Holland  could  hardly  raise  a  sheaf  of  grain, — but  she  had  the  largest  granary 
in  the  world.  She  had  no  grazing  fields, — but  she  became  the  centre  of  the 
woollen  manufactures  of  Europe.  Not  a  wild  or  cultivated  forest  waved 
over  her  soil, — but  she  built  more  ships  than  all  the  other  nations.  She  could 
not  even  grow  her  own  flax, — but  she  was  weaving  linen  for  the  rest  of 
Europe.  In  resisting  the  despotism  of  Spain,  Holland  enriched  herself  by 
despoiling  the  commerce  of  her  enemy.  The  treasures  of  all  lands  and  all 
seas  flowed  into  her  ports,  and  a  strong  republic,  guided  by  the  political  wis- 
dom, and  sustained  by  the  valor  and  virtue  of  a  great  people,  set  to  the  world 
the  most  brilliant  example  that  had  ever  been  offered,  of  the  blessings  which 
follow  the  establishment  of  civil  liberty.  It  is  not  strange  that  the  genius 
of  an  American  historian,  bathed  as  it  was  in  the  baptismal  font  of  cis-Atlantic 
freedom,  should  in  this  enticing  field  have  found  entrancing  scenes  for  revelling. 

Holland  now  stood  at  the  front  of  liberty  and  civilization  in  Europe.  She 
had  wiped  out  from  her  soil  the  last  vestige  of  Spanish  despotism.  The  Lu- 
theran Reformation  had  emancipated  the  altars  of  God,  and  the  deliberations 
of  her  senate  chambers.  She  alone,  of  all  the  nations,  could  extend  the  hand 
of  welcome  to  the  Pilgrim  fathers,  who  found  little  to  choose  between  the 
tyranny  of  the  Anglican  Church, — which,  in  the  harlot  embrace  of  the  State, 
had  hardly  taken  the  first  step  on  the  road  to  liberty  of  conscience, — and  the 
Church  of  the  Middle  Ages  ;  for  she  still  preserved  somewhat  of  the  spirit  which 
had  restrained  the  rapacity  of  Feudal  lords,  and  curbed  the  despotism  of 
Princes.  But  while  England  had  lost  whatever  she  once  held  under  the  old 
Church,  of  the  splendors  of  a  great  hierarchy,  and  the  magnificence  of  a  still 
more  imposing  ritual,  she  was  in  that  miserable  transition  state  where  all 
that  existed  in  the  form  of  a  bitter  spirit  of  persecution  in  Rome,  was  mingled 
with  petty  acts  of  tyranny  to  enforce  conformity  in  ritual  and  worship. 

All  this  was  offensive  and  disgusting  to  the  pride  of  such  men  as  Carver, 
Bradford,  Winslow  and  Miles  Standish,  and  so  they  left  England  for  a  '  better 
land.'  These  men  were  pilgrims:  precisely  what  they  pretended  to  be. 
They  were  in  search  of  a  home ;  and  where  Liberty  dwelt,  there  they  would 
find  one : — there  could  be  no  other  home  for  them.  When  at  last  they  had 
seen,  to  their  grief,  that  in  worn-out  old  Europe  there  was  no  place  to  build 
up  a  fair  heritage  for  the  future,  they  tore  up  the  tree  of  liberty  by  the  roots, 
and  brought  it  to  a  more  congenial  clime.  It  was  in  that  spirit  they  reached 
the  shores  of  Massachusetts ;  and  it  was  with  souvenirs  just  as  dear  to  them 
that  the  Hollanders  made  their  first  settlement  on  the  Island  of  Manhattan. 

Henry  Hudson.  The  Half -moon  inside  of  Sandy  Hook.  Sept.  3,  1609. — 
Before  we  greet  the  brave  sailor  who  had  just  passed  Navesink  in  his  little 
yacht,  we  must  go  back  to  find  out  how  the  storm-torn  Half-moon  had  found 
its  way  into  these  strange  waters. 


HUDSON  SEEKS  A   NEW  PASSAGE   TO  ASIA.  75 

The  explorations  of  the  English  on  the  shores  of  North  America,  and  theii 
success  in  the  fisheries  of  Newfoundland,  had  already  attracted  the  attention 
of  the  opulent  merchants  of  Holland,  and  the  embarkation  of  Smith  for  Vir- 
ginia in  1607  had  roused  their  spirit  of  rivalry.  The  Dutch  East  India  Com- 
pany had  been  chartered  in  the  spring  of  1602,  its  field  being  restricted  to 
the  exclusive  commerce  beyond  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  on  the  east,  and 
the  Straits  of  Magellan  at  the  west.  This  was  the  first  commercial  monopo- 
list company,  which  had  so  many  successors. 

The  strife  of  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese  for  the  commerce  of  Asia  was 
now  the  chief  object  of  Dutch  ambition  ;  and  so  far  were  they  successful,  they 
held  for  a  long  time  that  enormous  commerce  with  Asia,  which  poured  such 
wealth  into  their  coffers.  As  the  English  could  lay  no  claim  to  the  approach 
to  Asia  by  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope, — since  all  these  commercial  rights  had 
been  ceded  to  the  East  India  Company  by  the  Dutch,  who  had  been  the 
friendly  allies  of  England  during  the  war  with  Spain, — the  merchants  of 
London  bethought  themselves  of  finding  another  passage-way.  For  this  pur- 
pose they  employed  Henry  Hudson  to  search  for  a  nearer  route  to  Asia  by 
sailing  to  the  north.  In  the  same  year  that  Smith  sailed  for  Virginia,  Hudson, 
with  a  small  vessel,  and  his  only  son  for  a  companion,  reached  the  shores  of 
Greenland,  and  penetrated  nearer  to  the  Pole  than  any  preceding  navigators. 
On  the  coast  of  Spitzbergen  he  encountered  icy  barriers  which  he  could  not 
pass.  But  the  attempt  was  renewed  the  succeeding  year,  for  he  believed  that 
through  the  waters  dividing  Spitzbergen  from  Nova  Zembla,  he  could  pass  to 
China.  But  he  returned  to  London,  and  his  employers  footed  the  loss.  As, 
however,  the  passion  of  his  life  was  to  make  such  a  discovery,  he  went  over 
to  Holland  and  offered  his  services  to  the  East  India  Company,  and  through 
the  influence  of  the  merchants  of  Amsterdam,  they  were  promptly  accepted. 

On  the  4th  of  April,  1609,  he  sailed  in  a  yacht  of  eighty  tons,  for  China, 
by  way  of  the  north-west.  Baffled  by  those  eternal  ice-fields,  he  gave  up 
further  effort,  and  being  fully  informed  of  Smith's  explorations  on  the  Vir- 
ginia coast,  he  turned  his  prow  towards  the  Chesapeake.  Escaping  the  tem- 
pests which  carried  away  his  foremast,  and  stripped  his  canvas,  he  found 
himself  drifting  among  the  fishermen  on  the  banks  of  Newfoundland.  But  he 
managed  to  reach  a  harbor  on  the  coast  of  Maine,  and  mooring  the  Half- 
moon  in  safety,  he  made  for  the  woods,  where  he  got  out  a  foremast,  with 
which,  after  making  further  repairs,  he  started  for  the  south.  He  gave 
to  Cape  Cod,  in  passing,  the  name  of  New  Holland,  and  on  the  18th  of 
August  was  at  the  mouth  of  the  James  River.  He  had  gone  too  far  south. 
Ten  days  later  he  was  in  Delaware  Bay.  But  he  gave  only  a  few  hours  to  the 
survey  of  that  region,  and  steering  to  the  north  was  greeted  on  the  2d  of 
September  with  the  '  pleasant  sight  of  the  high  hills  of  Navesink.'  Some- 
what bewildered  with  the  rivers  and  inlets  around  the  flat  beach,  he  doubled 
the  beetling  bluff,  and  on  the  3d  day  of  September,  with  his  little  son,  saw  the 
New  Jersey  Highlands,  as  John  Cabot  had,  with  his  boy  Sebastian,  first  looked 
on  the  '  cismal  cliffs  of  Labrador.' 


]6        DISCOVERY  AND  EXPLORATION  OF   THE  HUDSON, 

Thus  the  three  great  points  where  civilization  on  the  western  coast  was 
to  plant  its  settlements,  and  from  which  streams  of  wealth  and  enterprise 
were  to  flow  over  the  continent,  were  at  last  reached.  Plymouth  Rock,  the 
mouth  of  the  Hudson,  and  the  settlement  at  Jamestown — New  England,  New 
York,  and  Virginia,  began  America  :  they  constitute  America  still ! 

Hudson  Explores  the  Great  River,  Sept.  3. — The  next  thirty  days  were 
given  to  an  exploration  ©f  the  Bay  of  New  York,  its  surrounding  shores,  and 
a  beautiful  sail  up  the  great  river,  which  has  ever  after  been  called  by  his 
name.  Bringing  the  Half-moon  to  anchor  on  the  Jersey  shore,  the  natives 
came  in  from  the  surrounding  country,  gayly  dressed  in  the  furs  and  feathers 
of  the  forest.  Launching  their  light  canoes,  they  quickly  clustered  around 
the  ship  with  a  warm  welcome,  and  eager  proposals  for  traffic.  Hudson 
describes  their  habits  and  customs.  They  seemed  to  be  a  happy  community, 
living  upon  maize  and  beans,  and  carrying  with  them  their  red  copper  pipes, 
with  earthen  bowls,  and  the  ever-present  elastic  bows  and  sharp  stone- 
pointed  arrows.  They  furnished  the  Half-moon  with  a  plentiful  supply  of 
good  oysters,  maize,  and  beans. 

It  was  the  loveliest  autumn  weather,  and  Hudson  was  entranced  with  the 
scene  around  him.  The  lofty  Palisades  were  clothed  with  ■  goodly  oakes,' 
grander  than  any  he  had  ever  seen  ;  and  the  Island  of  Manhattan,  sheltered 
by  a  mighty  forest,  stretched  down  the  eastern  side  of  the  river.  Away 
behind  him  rose  the  green  hills  of  Staten  Island,  and  the  towering  heights  of 
Navesink  j  from  the  north  rolled  down  the  glorious  river,  which  at  first  he 
believed  could  only  be  an  arm  of  the  sea.  But  loosing  the  Half  moon  to  a 
delicious  southern  breeze,  he  passed  up  the  stream;  and  when  he  found 
how  great  a  discovery  he  had  made,  as  he  lay  off  Yonkers,  he  wrote  that  'it 
was  as  fair  a  land  as  can  be  trodden  by  the  foot  of  man.'  And  so  he  floated 
on  leisurely,  till  a  fresh  breeze  swept  him  by  West  Point  into  the  broader 
reaches  beyond. 

In  the  afternoon  of  the  15th  he  came  in  view  of  the  magnificent  range  of 
the  Catskills,  and  as  the  sun  was  setting  behind  them,  he  dropped  anchor  off 
the  bold  bluff  on  the  east  of  the  river,  where  a  beautiful  city  called  by  his 
name  was  soon  afterwards  founded.  The  next  day,  at  the  invitation  of  an 
aged  chief  of  the  tribe  of  River  Indians,  he  went  on  shore  to  receive  their 
hospitalities.  Here  he  found  himself  surrounded  by  every  sign  of  peace  and 
comfort.  The  chief  showed  him  to  a  large  circular  building  made  of  oak  bark, 
with  a  high  arched  roof,  which  was  filled  with  beans  and  maize,  and  stacked 
around  stood  the  last  year's  harvest, — '  enough  to  load  three  ships.'  A  feast 
was  prepared,  and  mats  were  laid  for  the  guests.  The  young  men  had  early 
gone  to  the  woods  with  their  bows  and  arrows,  and  soon  returned  with  a 
quantity  of  pigeons.  These  were  cooked,  and  succotash  of  corn  and  beans 
was  served  in  red  wooden  bowls.  But  Hudson  would  not  prolong  his  visit, 
and  as  he  was  starting  for  his  ship,  the  Indians  one  and  all  snapped  their 
arrows  in  pieces,  and  cast  them  into  the  fire,  in  token  of  friendship. 


RETURN  AND  FATE   OF  HENRY  HUDSON.  Tt 

Traditions  of  that  visit  were  long  preserved  by  the  little  River  Tribe,  and 
the  stories  are  still  told  to  the  children  of  the  neighborhood.  The  navigator 
had  found  a  balmier  climate  than  England,  or,  above  all,  Holland,  ever  knew, 
No  river  in  Europe  could  match  in  the  magnificence  of  its  flood  and  forest 
scenery  the  lordly  stream  he  had  discovered.  The  soil  was  a  miracle  of  fer- 
tility ;  the  woods  were  haunted  with  game ;  and  the  contented  and  friendly  in- 
habitants had  added  to  all  these  attractions,  the  charms  of  the  most  abundant 
hospitality.  '  Of  all  the  lands,'  said  Hudson,  '  on  which  I  ever  set  my  foot, 
this  is  the  best,  for  tillage.' 

He  describes  the  month  he  passed  in  the  North  River  as  one  of  constant 
delight  and  strange  surprises.  And  well  he  may,  for  as  the  shores  of  the 
Hudson  must  then  have  appeared,  still  clothed  with  the  unmarred  beauty  of 
nature, — water,  mountain,  and  sky  all  bathed  in  the  gorgeous  atmosphere  of 
the  Indian  summer — it  must  have  made  a  spectacle  of  which  even  those  of 
us  who  dwell  here  to-day  can  form  no  just  conception  except  by  the  witch- 
ery of  fancy.  But  these  halcyon  days  could  not  last  forever :  the  Half- 
moon  had  made  profitable  traffic,  and  she  was  ready  for  sea.  . 

Hudson  Returns,  Oct.  4,  1609. — On  this  day  he  '  sailed  out  of  the  great 
mouth  of  the  great  river,'  for  home.  A  prosperous  voyage  of  a  little  more 
than  a  month  brought  the  Half-moon  into  the  port  of  Dartmouth.  Here  she 
and  her  cargo  were  seized  by  the  British  authorities,  on  the  alleged  superiority 
of  the  claims  of  England  to  the  regions  she  had  invaded.  The  Half  moon  was 
indeed  afterwards  restored  to  the  Amsterdam  merchants,  and  the  written  re- 
port of  their  commander  had  been  already  forwarded.  But  he  was  never 
again  to  gaze  on  the  shores  of  the  Hudson,  nor  reap  any  reward  for  his  signal 
services  to  the  Netherlands  of  the  Old  World,  or  the  New.  His  name, 
however,  was  to  be  a  household  word  in  the  myriad  homes  that  were  to 
adorn  the  green  banks  of  his  lordly  river. 

Hudson's  Fate,  16 10. — Still  swayed  by  his  ruling  passion,  and  believ- 
ing that  he  could  yet  find  a  new  passage  to  China,  the  English  merchants 
equipped  for  Hudson  another  vessel,  the  Discoverer,  with  which  he  put  to 
sea.  Climbing  beyond  the  fires  of  Hecla,  the  coast  of  Greenland,  and  Fro- 
bisher's  Straits,  till  he  entered  'a  great  sea  to  the  westward,'  he  believed  he 
had  realized  the  dream  of  his  life.  But  he  found  himself  in  the  midst  of  an 
inextricable  labyrinth  of  bays  and  islands,  from  which  there  was  no  escape. 
Amidst  the  discontent  of  his  crew  and  the  merciless  frost  he  passed  the  long, 
dark  winter.  It  was  far  into  the  next  year  before  spring  came,  and  his  crew 
had  grown  too  mutinous  to  be  any  longer  controlled.  His  provisions  had 
given  out,  and  when  he  handed  to  his  men  the  last  crust,  ■  he  wept  as  he  gave 
it  them.'  Maddened  by  hunger,  they  vented  all  their  wrath  upon  the 
unfortunate  commander.  He  was  seized  and  cast  into  the  shallop ;  his  little 
ion  was  pitched  in  after  him,  and  then  seven  others,  four  of  whom  were  in  a 
dying  state      i  Seeing  his  commander  thus  exposed,  Philip  StarTe,  the  carpen- 


78  BLOCK  DISCOVERS  THE  CONNECTICUT. 

ter,  demanded  and  gained  leave  to  share  his  fate  ;  and  just  as  the  ship  made 
its  way  out  of  the  ice  on  a  midsummer  day,  in  a  latitude  where  the  sun  at 
that  season  hardly  goes  down,  and  evening  twilight  mingles  with  the  dawn,  the 
shallop  was  cut  loose.  What  became  of  Hudson  ?  Did  he  die  miserably  of 
starvation  ?  Did  he  reach  land,  to  perish  from  the  fury  of  the  natives  ?  Was 
he  crushed  between  ribs  of  ice  ?  The  returning  ship  encountered  storms  by 
which  he  was  probably  overwhelmed.  The  gloomy  waste  of  waters  which 
bears  his  name  is  his  tomb  and  his  monument ! '  ■ 

Adriaen  Block.  1611-1 613.— Between  these  years,  however,  private  en- 
terprise profited  by  Hudson's  discovery.  ■  The  wealthy  Adriaen  Block,  with 
Hendrik  Christiansen,  chartered  a  ship  with  the  skipper  Ryser,'  and  made  a 
successful  trading  voyage  to  New  York,  bringing  back  with  them  two  of  the 
sons  of  the  native  sachems. 

March  27,  1614. — In  the  delay  of  granting  the  West  India  Company's 
charter,  a  privilege  was  conceded  to  any  adventurers  for  four  successive 
voyages,  and  the  merchants  sent  out  a  fleet  of  five  small  vessels — the  Fortune, 
of  Amsterdam,  commanded  by  Christiansen,  the  Tiger,  by  Adriaen  Block,  and 
three  others,  sailed  for  New  York.  The  Tiger  was  burned  in  New  York,  but 
Adriaen  Block  constructed  for  his  own  explorations  a  little  yacht  of  sixteen 
tons,  which  he  called  the  Unrest.  Passing  up  the  East  River,  then-  new  sail- 
ing ground,  he  was  the  first  European  sailor  to  pass  through  Hell  Gate,  and 
into  the  calmer  waters  of  Long  Island  Sound. 

Gliding  by  the  islands  that  cluster  in  front  of  Norwalk,  he  discovered  the 
beautiful  river  still  called  the  Housatonic.  Further  on,  he  entered  the  mouth 
of  '  the  Freshwater,'  which  has  always  persisted  in  bearing  its  native  name, 
Connecticut  Its  banks  were  clothed  with  heavy  forests,  except  in  some 
grassy  reaches  cultivated  by  the  Indians,  one  being  where  Wethersfield  now 
stands ;  another,  the  site  of  Hartford.  Reaching  the  Sound  again,  he  found 
the  Pequods  living  on  the  bank  of  their  river  Thames.  He  touched  at  Mon- 
tauk  Point,  then  inhabited  by  a  savage  race.  But  beyond  it  opened  the 
Atlantic,  when  he  made  the  discovery  that  he  had  circumnavigated  what  was 
afterwards  appropriately  called  Long  Island.  Exploring  the  shores  to  the  East, 
he  gave  to  the  land  encircled  by  the  two  channels  the  name  of  Roode  Eiland. 
He  followed  the  coast  as  far  as  Nahant,  ignorant  that  John  Smith  was  at  the  same 
time  mapping  the  coast  of  Maine  and  Massachusetts.  Cornells  Hendrickssen 
was  doing  so  well  in  the  fur  trade,  that  Block  left  with  him  his  first  American- 
built  yacht,  and  returned  to  Holland  in  one  of  the  other  vessels  of  the  fleet. 

The  Charter  Granted  for  New  Netherlands  Oct.  n,  1614. — The  States  - 
General  granted  to  the  same  Company  a  three  years'  monopoly  to  trade  from 
the  40th  to  the  45th  degree  of  latitude,  generously  extending  the  rights  of  the 
Amsterdam  merchants  over  the  very  territory  that  Capt.  Smith  had  that  same 

1  Bancroft. 


THE  POLITICAL    CONDITION  OF  HOLLAND.  79 

year  mapped  and  called  New  England.  For  a  time,  however,  there  was  nc 
conflict  in  their  claims,  and  Christiansen  ascended  the  Hudson  river  as  far  as 
Castle  Island,  just  south  of  Albany,  where  for  the  convenience  of  traffic,  and 
protection,  he  built  a  fortified  '  truck-house,'  which  was  garrisoned  with  a  dozen 
men.  To  this  station  they  gave  the  name  of  Nassau,  and  they  called  the  Hud- 
son river  the  Maurice,  after  their  illustrious  countryman.  This  was  the  first 
permanent  establishment  of  the  Dutch  on  the  Hudson,  and  for  a  long  period 
a  profitable  and  extensive  trade  in  peltry  was  carried  on  with  the  Indians. 

The  Iroquois. — The  Hollanders  now  began  their  long  and  friendly  inter- 
course with  the  Six  Nations,1  which  but  for  the  injustice  and  tyranny  of 
Kieft  would  never  have  been  disturbed.  The  French  had  already  founded 
Quebec  and  Montreal,  and  while  Hudson  was  sailing  up  his  great  river, 
Champlain  was  penetrating  the  Northern  frontier. 

But  the  moment  was  approaching  when  the  religious  agitations  throughout 
the  Low  Countries  were  to  be  renewed  with  intensity,  and  culminate  in  the 
Thirty  Years'  War  of  religion  in  Germany.  It  was  still  the  development  of 
the  great  principle  of  the  Reformation  which  was  dividing  all  communities  into 
the  two  parties, — the  one  for  progress,  the  other  for  conservatism,  if  not  retro- 
gression. Even  in  Holland,  where  the  Reformation  had  achieved  its  chief 
conquests,  two  parties  had  grown  up.  The  stadtholder  led  the  one  which 
represented  the  principles  of  close  corporations  and  commercial  monopolies. 
On  his  side  were  wealth  and  power ;  on  the  other,  the  popular  interests.  The 
one  represented  the  spirit  of  Feudalism  and  monopoly,  not  only  in  commerce, 
but  in  land,  carrying  with  it  political  power,  and  rendering  deliberative  as- 
semblies aristocratic.  While  the  stadtholder  wished  to  centralize  all  power 
in  the  States-General,  the  truer  republican  spirit,  represented  by  Olden  Barne- 
veldt  and  Grotius, — the  former  the  founder  of  the  republic,  and  the  latter  the 
greatest  political  writer  of  his  age,  and  an  authority  still  of  frequent  citation  in 
matters  of  national  and  international  law, — sided  with  the  Provincial  assem- 
blies. They  not  only  clearly  defined  the  rights,  but  valiantly  asserted  the 
sovereignty  of  the  old  municipalities  that  had  borrowed  their  civil  franchises 

1  New  York,  at  the  time  of  its  discovery  and  settle-  ked  arm  raised,  and  addressing  in  impassioned  strains 

merit  by  the  Europeans,  was  inhabited  by  a  race  of  men  a  group  of  similar  persons,   sitting  upon  the  ground 

distinguished  above  all  the  other  aborigiues  of  this  con-  around  him,  would,  to  use  the  illustration  of  an   early 

tinent  for  their  intelligence  and  prowess.     Five  distinct  historian  of  this  State,  give  no  faint  picture  of  Rome  in 

and  independent  tribes,  speaking  a  language  radically  her  early  days. 

the  same,  and  practising  similar  customs,  had  united  They  were  very  methodical  in  their  harangues.  When 

in  forming  a  confederacy  which,   for  durability  and  in  conference  with  other  nations,  at  the  conclusion  of 

power,  was  unequalled  in  Indian  history.     They  were  every  important  sentence  of  the  opposite   speaker,  a 

the    Mohawks,  Oneidas,    Onondagas,    Cayugas,  and  sachem  gave  a  small  stick  to  the  orator  who  was  to  re- 

Senecas,  called  the  Iroquois  by  the   French,   and  the  ply,  charging  him  at  the   same  time   to  remember  it. 

Five  Nations  by  the  English.     In  cases  of  great  em-  After  a  short  consultation  with  the  others,  he  was  en- 

ergency  each  tribe  or  nation  acted  independently ;  but  abled  to  repeat  most  of  the  discourse,   which  he  an- 

a  general  council  usually  assembled  at  Onondaga,  near  swered  article  by  article. 

the  centre  of  their  territory,  and  determined  upon  peace  These  nations  were  distinguished  for  their  prowess 

>x  war,  and  all  other  matters  which  regarded  the  in-  in  war,  as  well  as  for  their  sagacity  and  eloquence  in 

terests  of  the  whole.     The  powers  of  this  council  appear  council.     War  was  their  delight.     Believing  it  to  be  the 

to  have  been  not  much  dissimilar  to  those  of  the  United  most  honorable  employment  of  men,  they  infused  into 

States  Congress  under  the  old  confederation.  their  children  in  early  life  high  ideas   of  military  glory. 

Their   language,    though   guttural,    was    sonorous.  They  carried  their  arms  into  Canada,  across  the  Con- 

Their  orators  studied  euphony  in   their  words  and  in  necticut,  to  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi,  and  almost  to 

their  arrangement.     Their  graceful  attitudes  and  ges-  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.     Formidable  by  their  numbers  and 

tures,  and   their  .-.verflowing  sentences,  rendered  their  their  skill,  they  excited  respect  and   awe  in   the  most 

discourses,  if  no    always  eloquent,  at  least  highly  im-  powerful    tribes,   and   exacted    tribute  and    obedience 

pressive.     An  erect  and  commanding  figure,  with   a  from  the  weak. — Introduction   to   Campbell's  Border 

blanket  thrown  loost  ly  over  the  shoulder,  with  his  na-  War/are  of  New  York. 


80        CHARTER    OF  THE  DUTCH   WEST  INDIA   COMPANY. 

from  the  Roman  code,  and  still  preserved  them.  The  strife  became  so  fierce 
that  Protestantism  itself  was  split  into  two  great  parties.  The  Calvinists  sided 
with  the  stadtholder.  Their  creed  was  despotic  in  its  claims  over  the  con- 
science, and  bitter  in  its  spirit  of  persecution.  It  was  burning  Servetus  at  the 
stake  in  Geneva.  In  the  summer  and  autumn  of  1618,  parties  came  into 
violent  collision,  and  Barneveldt  and  Grotius  were  imprisoned.  The  latter 
was  soon  afterwards  sentenced  to  imprisonment  for  life,  while  the  venerable 
Barneveldt,  the  greatest  patriot  of  Holland,  died  on  the  scaffold. 

These  fierce  struggles  in  the  Low  Countries  led  directly  to  the  settle- 
ment of  New  Netherland.  But  for  these,  the  work  would  have  been  done 
by  the  English.  Hitherto,  the  religious  element  had  had  little  or  nothing  to 
do  with  the  motives  of  the  Hollanders  in  their  ventures  of  trade  or  explora- 
tion.    But  this  element  soon  developed  itself. 

Charter  of  the  Dutch  West  India  Company.  June  3,  162 1. — The  demands 
of  the  merchants  of  Holland  could  no  longer  be  resisted ;  and  on  the  3d  of 
June,  162 1,  the  Dutch  West  India  Company  was  chartered.  It  conferred 
upon  its  members  the  exclusive  privilege  of  trafficking  and  planting  colonies 
on  the  American  coast,  from  the  Straits  of  Magellan  to  the  furthest  north. 
It  received  all  the  pledges  of  favor  and  protection  which  the  States-General 
could  confer  as  patrons,  and  in  war  as  allies.  All  the  Low  Countries  be- 
came interested,  and  millions  were  subscribed  by  the  great  cities.  They  were 
governed  by  a  Board  of  nineteen  Directors,  whose  power  was  almost  un- 
limited. Their  field  extended  all  down  the  South  American  coast ;  while  in 
North  America,  New  Netherland  was  their  centre.  Amsterdam — one  of  the 
five  Chambers  of  Government  and  Administration  of  the  Company — as- 
sumed the  control  of  what  was  soon  to  be  the  Dutch  colonies  on  the  Hudson 
and  the  Delaware.  This  was  all  in  contravention  of  the  claims  of  England, 
and  some  protest  was  made  against  it  by  Sir  Dudley  Carleton,  the  British 
ambassador  at  the  Hague.  But  the  colony  of  Virginia  had  done  so  poorly, 
no  effectual  resistance  was  offered  to  the  Dutch  further  north ;  and  when  in 
the  year  following  the  granting  of  their  charter,  their  ships  came  on  the  coast, 
they  found  none  to  offer  resistance. 

The  Colony  of  New  Netherland  Founded,  1623. — In  the  spring  of  this 
year  thirty  families  were  transported  on  a  ship  of  260  tons — the  New  Nether- 
land— made  up  chiefly  of  Walloons,  Protestants,  who  had  fled  from  persecu- 
tion in  the  Belgian  Provinces.  They  carried  with  them  the  first  religious 
element  into  the  Dutch  settlements.  Some  of  them,  under  the  leadership  of 
Cornelis  Jacobsen  May,  settled  on  Timber  Creek,  which  empties  into  the 
Delaware  a  few  miles  below  Camden,  and  there  they  built  Fort  Nassau. 

In  the  meantime,  -Adriaen  Joris  had  constructed  Fort  Orange,  on  the  spot 
where  the  chief  business  part  of  Albany  now  stands,  and  there  eighteen 
families  had  built  their  little  huts  under  its  protecting  shadow,  while  the 
friendship  of  the  surrounding  tribes  of  Indians  had  been  in  good  faith  guaran- 


FRIENDLY  DUTCH  AND  PILGRIM  INTERCOURSE.  81 

teed.  This  colony  prospered  from  the  start ;  their  ships  returned  with  rich 
cargoes  of  furs,  and  brought  back  emigrants.  These  Dutch  settlements  were 
under  the  government  of  May,  as  First  Director,  and  all  the  powers  of  civil 
administration  were  conferred  upon  him,  except  punishment  by  death. 

1625. — William  Verhulst  succeeded  May  in  1625,  and  the  colony  giew 
rapidly.  Two  large  ships  arrived  with  horses  and  cattle,  swine  and  sheep  ; 
children  were  born  ;  broad  fields  were  cultivated ;  traffic  with  the  Indians  ex- 
tended up  the  Hudson,  and  along  the  shores  of  the  Mohawk,  and  the  smaller 
chain  of  lakes  that  connect  the  waters  of  Central  New  York  with  those  of  the 
Delaware  on  one  side,  and  the  Hudson  on  the  other.  The  new  stadtholder 
inflamed  once  more  a  patriotic  spirit  among  the  Hollanders  at  home,  and  at- 
tention was  directed  to  the  Dutch  settlement ;  and  the  official  report  of  Henry 
Hudson  about  these  regions  was  published.  The  following  year  a  new  impulse 
was  given  to  Dutch  enterprise  on  these  shores. 

The  First  Governor  of  New  Nether  land.  May  4,  1 6  2  6. — Peter  Minuit  was 
sent  out  with  authority  as  Director-General  over  New  Netherland,  and  with 
him  commenced  Dutch  proprietorship  in  the  soil.  His  first  step  was  to  pur- 
chase the  Island  of  Manhattan  from  the  Indians — a  tract  of  land  which  may 
have  been  considered  cheap  at  the  price  paid  for  it,  viz.,  twenty-four  dollars, 
or  eight  and  one-third  cents  per  acre.  He  chose  the  south  end  of  the  island, 
fronting  directly  on  the  Bay,  for  a  battery ;  a  spot  of  ground  which,  in  the 
midst  of  all  the  earlier  vicissitudes,  and  later  changes  of  the  island,  has 
maintained  its  name  and  its  position,  having  witnessed  many  scenes  we  shall 
hereafter  allude  to.  A  fort  was  constructed,  which  received  the  name  of  New 
Amsterdam. 

In  the  New  World,  no  settlement  had  commenced  under  such  fair  auspices. 
Friendly  relations  with  the  Indians  were  cultivated  and  maintained ;  traffic 
with  them  was  carried  on  upon  a  constantly  growing  scale,  and  wealth  poured 
in  rapidly.  The  kindest  feelings  had  prevailed  between  the  Pilgrims  and  the 
Hollanders  at  home,  and  those  friendly  relations  were  now  to  be  perpetuated 
on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  The  Plymouth  colony  being  the  nearest  neigh- 
bor to  New  Amsterdam,  the  Governor  of  the  Island  addressed  to  Governor 
Bradford,  in  March,  1627,  a  formal  letter,  breathing  the  spirit  of  the  warmest, 
friendship,  and  proffering  * good-will  a?id  service]  with  '  kindness  and  neigh- 
borhood.1 It  spoke  of  '  the  nearness  of  our  native  countries,  the  friendship 
of  our  forefathers,  and  the  new  covenant  between  the  States-General  and 
England  against  the  Spaniards.' 

The  Plymouth  Governor  replied  to  the  letter  in  a  warm  and  generous  spirit, 
which  showed  the  largeness  and  magnanimity  of  his  character.  '  We  accept,' 
he  says,  '  this  testimony  of  love.  Our  children  shall  never  forget  the  good 
and  courteous  entreaty  which  we  found  in  your  country,  and  shall  desire  your 
prosperity  forever.'  But  he  displayed  somewhat  of  the  Yankee  shrewdness 
6 


82  PROGRESS   OF   THE  DUTCH  SETTLEMENTS. 

in  another  clause  of  his  letter,  for  he  reminds  these  friendly  Dutch  intrudeis 
that  the  English  patent  for  New  England  extended  to  40  degrees,  within 
whose  limits  they  had  ■  no  right  to  plant  or  trade/  and  he  begs  them  not  to 
send  any  of  their  ships  into  the  Narraganset.  But  the  reply  of  the  Director 
showed  his  Dutch  pluck.  '  Our  authority  to  trade  and  plant  we  derive  from 
the  States  of  Holland,  and  will  defend  it'  There  was,  however,  no  hostile 
feeling,  nor  any  intention  of  collision  between  the,  two  friendly  colonies. 
Lest  there  should  be  misunderstanding,  however,  in  the  fall  of  the  same  year 
Minuit  sent  his  deputy,  De  Rasieres,  on  a  pacific  and  formal  mission  to  the 
Pilgrims.  The  ambassador  was  attended  by  all  the  pomp  and  circumstance 
which  his  dignity  demanded.  On  landing  at  Monument  with  his  trumpeters 
and  soldiers,  he  marched  over  the  neck  of  land,  and  at  Scusset  was  met 
by  a  boat  from  Plymouth  Rock,  and  ■  honorably  attended  with  the  noise  of 
trumpets.'  Hospitalities  were  extended  and  enjoyed,  and  friendly  relations 
were  established  ;  although  the  Dutchman  was  advised  to  recommend  the 
people  of  New  Amsterdam  to  '  clear  their  title,'  without  any  loss  of  time. 
This  would  not  seem  to  have  presaged  well,  but  no  harm  came  from  it. 

And  so  the  colony  of  New  Netherland  went  on  flourishing.  In  1628, 
only  five  years  from  their  first  landing,  it  had  a  population  of  two  hundred  and 
seventy  men,  women,  and  children,  all  counted,  and  making  a  strange  mixture 
of  Dutch,  Walloons,  and  African  slaves  :  for  be  it  known  that  the  Dutch  first 
introduced,  and,  for  a  considerable  time,  held  a  monopoly  in  the  trade  of 
stealing  men  from  the  coast  of  Africa  and  selling  them  into  slavery  in  this 
country. 

Although  the  settlers  on  Manhattan  Island  were  neither  Pilgrims  nor  Puri- 
tans, still  they  were  earnest  in  their  religion;  and  in  the  spring  of  1628  the 
Rev.  Jonas  Michaelius  came  over  to  establish  a  church.  On  the  first  cele- 
bration of  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's  Supper  there  were  fifty  communicants. 
From  such  small  beginnings  trade  with  the  Indians  was  carried  on  with  great 
activity,  and  the  Dutch  agents  were  pushing  up  all  the  streams  that  branch 
off  from  the  Delaware  into  New  Jersey  and  Pennsylvania ;  and  from  the 
Hudson  to  the  banks  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  and  the  shores  of  Lake  Ontario. 

Feudal  Institutions  in  America. — This  language  sounds  strange  enough, 
tat  the  seeds  of  Feudalism  were  planted  on  our  soil,  and  the  remains  of  it  are 
;till  left  on  the  banks  of  the  Hudson.  It  is  curious,  in  tracing  its  origin,  to 
see  that  however  much  of  a  political  likeness  prevailed  among  the  communi- 
ties that  settled  in  Virginia,  Massachusetts,  and  New  York,  the  social  differ- 
ences between  them  were  very  wide. 

I  have  thus  drawn  the  outlines  of  the  three  most  important  settlements 
that  have  been  made  in  the  United  States.  If  I  have  seemed  to  give  a  dispro- 
portionate attention  to  them  as  compared  with  all  the  rest  that  were  to  follow, 
I  have  had  an  object  in  it.  The  common  reader  of  American  history  seldom 
ge*s  a  clear  idea  of  the  elements  which  made  up  our  national  character.  They 


ELEMENTS  OF  CHARACTER  AND  WEALTH.  83 

were  all  strained  out  of  the  Old  World ;  and,  although  ultimately  blended  into 
a  harmonious  whole,  yet  it  was  only  by  the  slow  process  of  time  that  these 
heterogeneous  materials  came  together.  If  the  Dutch  had  preponderated  as 
at  one  time  it  seemed  likely  they  would, — for  Holland  had  reached  such  a 
period  of  glory,  advanced  her  political  institutions  so  far,  and  covered  earth 
and  sea  with  her  commerce  and  augmented  wealth,  far  transcending  that  of 
any  other  nation,  not  excepting  Spain  herself — if,  at  this  period,  her  energies 
had  not  been  drawn  off  by  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  absorbing  her  surplus 
population,  and  making  her  surplus  strength  tributary  to  commerce  on  the 
ocean, — North  America  would  have  very  easily  become  another  Holland — a 
second  Germany.  Settling  in  New  York,  they  had  the  fairest  chance.  The 
soil  of  Pennsylvania  was  indeed  more  fertile,  and  agriculture  was  to  prove  a 
source  of  great  wealth ;  but  her  capital,  Philadelphia,  could  never  be  any- 
thing but  a  large  and  prosperous  inland  town,  while  New  York  could  never 
be  prevented  from  becoming  a  metropolis.  Boston  would  be  the  commercial 
centre  of  trade  and  manufactures,  fisheries  and  explorations,  at  the  east; 
but  the  severity  of  the  climate,  and  the  hardness  of  the  soil,  would  forever 
limit  the  extent  of  her  growth  and  power.  It  would  be  strong  in  the  strength 
of  individuals  and  separate  communities.  All  appliances  would  develop 
force  of  character.  The  spirit  of  thrift  and  economy ;  her  myriad-sided  ingenu- 
ity, invention,  discovery,  and  contrivance  ;  her  keen  perception  of  individual 
rights ;  her  persistence  in  the  establishment  of  institutions  for  culture,  learn- 
ing, and  religion,  and  her  jealousy  of  foreign  interference,  were  all  to  combine 
to  give  to  New  England  an  enormous  intellectual  predominance  over  the 
thoughts  of  the  nation ;  while  the  equal  distribution  of  wealth,  comfort,  and 
independence  among  the  people,  would  make  them  the  most  prosperous  and 
extraordinary  cluster  of  communities  on  the  earth. 

Virginia  was  then,  as  she  is  now,  the  representative  of  the  South,  Plant- 
ing, and  not  manufactures ;  agriculture,  and  not  commerce,  was  to  be  her 
chief  business.  Here  alone  lay  her  sources  of  wealth.  They  were  to  be 
large,  but  few ;  there  was  to  be  little  diversity  of  interest,  and  no  general 
development  of  enterprise.  She  imparted  the  same  character  to  the  States 
around  her ;  and  as  she  grew  in  population,  the  surplus  found  inducements 
for  emigration,  which  gave  the  first  establishment  to  Kentucky,  and  led  her 
pioneers  across  the  Mississippi.  These  were  the  distinguishing  traits  of  her 
character,  and  they  account  for  the  type  she  first  assumed,  and  has  so  per- 
sistently maintained. 

When  we  come  to  speak  of  African  slavery,  we  shall  see  that  it  was  no 
accident  which  determined  the  growth  of  that  institution.  The  mere  fact  that 
in  1620  a  Dutch  ship  landed  a  score  of  Africans  at  Jamestown,  who  consti- 
tuted the  nucleus  of  slavery  which  was  to  overshadow  the  State,  and  become 
the  chief  feature  of  its  existence,  would  have  had  no  special  significance  had  ' 
not  African  labor  been  wanted  there.  No  accident  made  it  flourish.  Till  cotton 
*  became  king,'  tobacco  was  master.  The  soil  and  climate  were  specially 
adapted  to  the  rror>  ■  ne^ro  labor  could  best  raise  it ;  and  it  was  the  cultiva- 


84  THE    THREE   GREAT  COLONIES  ANALYZED. 

tion  of  tobacco  that  gave  the  first  great  start  in  wealth  to  that  State,  while 
another  source  that  long  brought  a  great  revenue  to  the  commonwealth  was 
the  sale  of  the  surplus  negro  population,  which  always  corresponded  to  the 
demand  as  the  new  lands  of  the  south  were  brought  under  cultivation. 

If  the  reader  carries  in  his  mind  a  clear  idea  of  the  elements  which  made 
up  these  three  great  colonies,  it  will  help  him  to  understand  better  our  subse- 
quent history.  He  will  as  clearly  trace  to  its  fountains  the  great  national  stream 
upon  which  we  are  now  floating,  as  he  can  the  sources  of  the  Mississippi,  in 
standing  at  Cairo,  where  the  Ohio  pours  its  silver  waters  into  the  clouded  flood 
which  had  already  received  the  vast  contributions  of  the  Missouri.  This  may 
not  be  the  luckiest  illustration  I  can  give,  but  it  suits  my  purpose. 

There  were  jealousies— territorial,  political,  and  religious— between  these 
three  colonies.  Slavery  for  a  long  time  was  an  institution  in  common,  and 
made  nobody  any  particular  trouble.  It  died  first  at  the  North,  and  flour- 
ished longest  at  the  South,  because  the  negro  is  a  tropical  man,  and  slavery 
is  a  tropical  institution.  It  could  not  long  survive  the  frost,  the  religion,  the 
enterprise,  and,  I  will  even  add,  the  humanity  of  the  North.  For  without 
arrogating  to  any  section  of  my  country  preeminence  in  virtue,  it  is  easy 
enough  to  account  for  a  higher  standard  of  moral  and  intellectual  culture 
where  the  soil  demands  more  labor  for  a  return  of  its  fruits ;  where  none  of 
the  enervating  influences  of  the  tropics  prevail ;  where  there  is  greater  intel- 
lectual and  physical  activity ;  where  there  is  a  keener  thirst  for  knowledge, 
and  the  spirit  of  enterprise  begets  a  spirit  of  universal  emulation.  Out  of 
such  materials  grow  naturally  and  inevitably,  social  conditions  of  a  higher,  as 
well  as  of  a  different  kind. 

But  to  Feudalism  : — It  is  plain  enough  to  see  how  planting  on  a  large  scale 
in  a  warm  climate,  and  the  capacities  of  the  soil  to  produce  tobacco,  cotton, 
rice,  and  sugar,  the  great  staples  of  the  world,  almost  without  rivalry, — the  two 
first,  certainly, — by  any  other  nation,  sustained  slavery,  which  was  a  Feudal 
institution.  But  it  is  curious  to  trace  how,  in  another  form,  its  very  spirit 
gained  foothold  at  the  north.  It  was  an  age  when  commerce  would  under- 
take few  adventures  without  exclusive  monopolies  granted  by  governments. 
This  idea  gave  origin  to  all  the  Royal  Charters  and  Grants  conferred  on  com- 
panies and  individuals.  Raleigh  was  Proprietary  of  Virginia  at  one  time,  and 
even  down  to  within  a  hundred  years  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  Penn 
received  as  a  gift  the  whole  State  of  Pennsylvania.  In  fact,  these  vast  ter- 
ritories were  parcelled  out  among  favorites  of  kings,  and  the  continent  was 
given  away  over  and  over  again.  In  no  other  way  would  it  have  been  so 
early  colonized  ;  and  when  there  is  only  one  way  to  do  a  thing,  it  is  always 
the  best  one. 

Holland  was  far  advanced  in  liberal  institutions.  She  had  nurtured  states- 
men who  were  to  be  venerated  in  all  succeeding  times  ;  whose  works  were 
to  be  guide-books  for  the  founders  of  States,  and  for  jurists   adjudicating 


rnncAS  axu  miaxton-omoh. 


IMPEDIMENTS   TO   COLONIAL   GROWTH.  85 

intei national  claims.  Still  her  ideas  of  civil  liberty  were  limited  chiefly  tc 
the  rights  of  municipalities, — to  the  freedom  and  franchises  of  cities.  They, 
as  well  as  her  institutions,  were  derived  from  the  old  Roman  Law.  The  great 
body  of  agricultural  classes  in  the  Low  Countries  had  nothing  to  do  with  the 
soil  but  to  live  on  it,  and  till  it  on  such  terms  as  its  lord  might  dictate. 
They  had  no  political  franchises  ;  they  did  not  dream  of  holding  fee-simple  in 
the  solid  earth.  The  Lordships  of  the  Netherlands  were  transferred  to  the 
New  Netherland,  and  the  settlers  were  ruled  by  a  Director-General.  His 
authority  was  modified  it  is  true,  by  the  infusion  of  the  Democratic  sentiment 
here  ;  and  his  arbitrary  power  was  restrained  by  the  supreme  authority  at 
home.  But  the  only  way  the  men  of  those  times  could  see  to  promote  col- 
onization in  New  Netherland,  was  to  carry  out  the  home  system.  Conse- 
quently large  grants  of  land  were  made  to  all  enterprising  capitalists  who 
chose  to  comply  with  the  prescribed  conditions.  Whoever  would  within  four 
years  take  out  and  settle  upon  the  soil  fifty  persons,  became  the  patroon  in 
absolute  fee  of  all  the  lands  he  colonized  at  his  own  expense.  They  were  re- 
stricted only  to  sixteen  miles  in  length,  or  eight  miles  on  each  side  of  a  river, 
limits  being  seldom  assigned  to  the  interior.  They  were  only  required  to 
comply  with  the  conditions  of  settlement,  and  to  recognize  the  rights  of 
the  Indians,  and  complete  their  titles  by  purchase.  The  institutions  and 
government  of  these  estates  were  vested  in  the  patroons.  There  was  no  pro- 
vision made  for  maintaining  education  or  religion.  These  depended  upon 
the  will  of  the  master  of  the  soil,  or  upon  the  tenants  who  worked  it.  A 
further  guarantee  was  given  by  the  Holland  Company  that  the  patroons  were 
to  be  furnished  with  negro  slaves,  as  long — they  were  wise  enough  to  add — 
as  the  Company  found  it  profitable.  But  the  most  onerous  restrictions  were 
laid  upon  manufacturers  and  commerce  :  neither  of  these  could  be  enter- 
tained.1 

I  shall  have  occasion  hereafter  to  show  how  blind  and  fatal  a  policy  this 
was,  and  how  cruelly  it  operated  in  the  colonies.  It  was  these  oppressive  re- 
strictions laid  upon  the  Thirteen  Colonies  when  they  came  under  the  exclu- 
sive control  of  Great  Britain,  that  began  to  alienate  them  from  the  mother 
country.  The  policy  of  the  governments  of  Europe,  and  of  its  chartered 
companies,  was,  all  through,  not  only  to  discourage  and  depress,  but  abso- 
lutely to  prohibit  anything  in  the  shape  of  freedom  of  manufactures  or  com- 
merce  here.  Without  regard  to  the  laws  of  nature,  the  indications  of  Provi- 
dence, or  the  exigencies  of  human  wants  and  conditions,  regulations  were 
enforced  which  accumulated  wrong  upon  wrong,  until  at  last  the  whole  moun- 
tain was  heaved  off  in  a  revolution.  By  the  hardest  indeed,  did  these  poo^ 
colonies  become  strong  enough  to  do  it — slowly  enough  did  their  European 
masters  learn  that  they  had  undertaken  a  job  they  could  never  carry  out. 

It  was  the  destiny  of  America  ultimately  to  change  all  this.     In  Europe, 

1The  colonists  were  forbidden  to  manufacture  any    impair  the  monopoly  of  the  Dutch  weavers  was  punish- 
woolen,  or  linen,  or  cotton  fabrics  :  not  a  web  might  be    able  as  a  perjury. — Bancroft,  vol.  ii.  p.  281. 
woven,  not  a  shuttle  thrown,  on  penalty  of  exile.     To 


86  THE  DUTCH  ON  THE  HUDSON  AND  DELAWARE. 

the  individual  was  nothing  j  here,  he  was  all.  From  the  start,  he  was  supreme 
in  New  England  j  for  there  the  golden-souled  thought  of  the  sacredness  of  man 
himself  as  an  individual — as  a  child  of  God,  and  an  equal  brother  of  his  fel- 
lows—had its  full  birth.  There  was  nothing  new  in  this  as  a  principle  laid 
down  ;  it  was  only  new  in  action.  It  had  all  been  said  before  by  the  wondrous 
Being  of  Palestine, 

'  Over  whose  acres  walk'd  those  blessed  feet, 
Which,  fourteen  hundred  years  ago,  were  nailed 
For  our  advantage,  on  the  bitter  cross.'  • 

But  what  had  the  world  cared  for  that?— except  the  neglected  millions 
who  had  thought  of  it  enough  in  the  gloom  of  their  desertion  and  suffering. 
But  as  for  Kings,  Barons,  Lords,  Popes,  Priests,  and  Patroons,— what  mattered 
all  this  to  them  ?  With  an  assumption  which  now  seems  infinite  in  its  blasphe- 
my, from  immemorial  time  the  anointed  King  had  been  'the  fountain  of  jus- 
tice, of  mercy,  and  of  honor.'  Even  in  England,  the  cradle  of  the  liberty  of 
all  nations,  Macaulay  tells  us  all  about  it  in  the  striking  picture  he  draws 
of  Royal  Power.3 

The  settlements  of  the  Dutch  on  the  Delaware  were  extended.  In  1629 
two  Directors  of  the  Amsterdam  Chamber — Samuel  Goden  and  Samuel 
Blommaert — purchased  from  the  Indians  a  tract  more  than  thirty  miles  long, 
from  Cape  Henlopen  to  the  mouth  of  the  Delaware,  and  this  Indian  title  is 
the  oldest  deed  for  land  in  Delaware. 

Kiliaen  van  Rensselaer,  another  of  the  Amsterdam  Directors,  became  lord 
of  much  larger  tracts  on  the  Hudson,  extending  north  and  south  of  Fort 
Orange,  these  purchases  having  been  made  from  the  Mohawk  and  Mohigan 
chiefs.  To  these,  other  additions  were  made,  until  his  manor  extended  twenty- 
four  miles  on  the  east  side  of  the  Hudson  river,  and  forty-eight  miles  into  the 
interior.  This  tract  he  immediately  began  to  colonize — sending  out  his  first 
emigrants  to  the  settlement  of  Renssalaerwyck — one  of  the  fairest  and  most 
interesting  regions  in  the  whole  country.  It  afterwards  held  the  capital  of  the 
State.  It  was  at  the  head  waters  of  navigation  on  the  Hudson  river  ;  near 
the  mouth  of  the  Mohawk,  which  drained  the  waters  of  the  great  water-shed 
stretching  from  Central  New  York  towards  the  Atlantic ;  near  Lake  Cham- 
plain,  and  the  upper  sources  of  the  Hudson ;  and  being  in  a  direct  line  from 

1  First  Part  of  King  Henry  IV.,  Act  i.  Scene  i.  economically  administered,  sufficed  to  meet  the  ordi 

a  The  prerogatives  of  the  sovereign  were  undoubtedly  nary  charges  of  government.    His  own  domains  were 

extensive.      The  spirit  of   religion  and   the  spirit  of  of  vast  extent.     He  was  also  feudal  lord  paramount  of 

chivalry  concurred  to  exalt  his  dignity.    The  sacred  the  whole  soil  of  his  kingdom,  and,  in  that  capacity, 

oil  had  been  poured  on  his  head.    It  was  no  disparage-  possessed  many  lucrative  and  many  formidable  rights, 

ment  to  the  bravescand  noblest  knights  to  kneel  at  his  which  enabled  him  to  annoy  and  depress  those  who 

feet.     His  person  was  inviolable.     He  alone  was  en-  thwarted  him,  and  to  enrich  and  aggrandize,  without 

titled  to  convoke  the  estates  of  the  realm  ;  he  could  at  any  cost  to  himself,   those  who  enjoyed  his  favor. — 

his  pleasure  dismiss  them  ;  and  his  assent  was  neces-  Macaulay's  History  of  Rngla?id%  vol.  i.  p.  14-15. 
sary  to  all  their  legislative  acts.     He  was  the  chief  of         In  the  middle  ages  the  state  of  society  was  widely 

the  executive  administration,  the  sole  organ  of  com-  different.     Rarely,  and   with   great  difficulty  did    the 

munication  with  foreign  powers,  the  captain  of  the  mili-  wrongs  of  individuals  come  to  the  knowledge  of  the 

tary  and  naval  forces  of   the  State,  the  fountain  of  public.      A  man   might  be   illegally  confined  during 

i'ustice,  of  mercy,  and  of  honor.     He  had  large  powers  many  months  in  the  Castle  of  Carlisle  or  Norwich,  and 

or  the  regulation  of  trade.     It  was  by  him  that  money  no  whisper  of  the  transaction  might  reach  London.     It 

was  coined,  that  weights  and  measures  were  fixed,  that  is  highly  probable  that  the  rack  had  been  many  years 

marts  and  havens  were  appointed.     His  ecclesiast'cal  in  use  before  the  great  majority  of  the  nation  had  the 

patronage  was  immense.      His  hereditary  revenu-s,  least  suspicion  that  it  was  so  employed. — Id.,  16-17. 


CAUSES  OF   THE  DECLINE   OF   THE  DUTCH.  87 

Boston  through  to  the  great  west ;  a  territory  which  became  the  theatre  of 
some  of  the  bloodiest  scenes  in  the  French  war,  embracing  the  battle-ground  of 
Saratoga,  where  the  tide  first  began  to  turn  against  England  in  the  war  for 
Independence. 

This  great  manor  grew  into  vast  importance  under  the  guardianship  and 
culture  of  Kiliaen  van  Rensselaer  and  his  descendants— a  family  which,  by 
intermarriages  with  many  others  of  the  early  settlers  on  the  shores  of  the 
Hudson,  has  left  a  brilliant  record  in  the  history  of  our  agriculture,  literature, 
statesmanship,  jurisprudence,  and  arms ;  embellishing  our  annals  with  many 
of  its  noblest  achievements  in  government  and  civilization. 

The  enterprise  of  the  Dutch  settlers,  and  their  friendly  relations  with  the 
Indians,  gave  them  a  monopoly  of  the  fur  trade  of  this  whole  region.  As 
they  brought  with  them  among  their  emigrants  all  classes  of  mechanics  and 
working  men,  cattle,  agricultural  implements,  and  seeds  of  every  variety, 
whenever  they  planted  a  settlement,  prosperity  and  plenty  bloomed  around  it. 

Their  first  settlement  on  the  Delaware  was  older  than  any  other  in  Penn- 
sylvania. It  was  established  by  a  company  of  which  Van  Rensselaer, 
Goden,  Blommaert,  and  other  enterprising  men  were  members  ;  and  soon 
the  shores  of  Delaware  Bay  showed  fields  of  wheat  and  tobacco,  and  wavinp 
Indian  corn.  In  163 1  another  colony  was  planted  on  Lewes  Creek,  jus*, 
inside  of  Cape  Henlopen,  where  a  fort  with  strong  palisades  was  thrown  up, 
promising  to  afford  protection  to  the  thirty  or  forty  souls  constituting  the 
colony,  the  name  of  Swanandel  being  given  to  the  place.  But  these  fair 
prospects  of  Dutch  settlement  were  speedily  overcast  by  an  act  of  folly  and 
crime  committed  by  Hasset,  the  agent  in  charge  of  the  settlement.  He  had 
wickedly  caused  the  death  of  an  Indian  chief.  The  foul  play  was  to  be  fully 
avenged.  On  the  first  visit  of  De  Veries,  who  had  been  absent  on  an  expedi- 
tion with  the  ship,  he  found  nothing  but  the  ruins  of  the  fort  and  palisades, 
and  the  charred  bones  of  the  last  of  his  colonists.  This  act  permanently  im- 
paired the  power  and  prosperity  of  the  Dutch  in  that  region  ;  for  before  the)' 
could  recover  the  soil  of  Delaware,  three  other  events  occurred  to  cripple 
their  authority  and  restrain  their  spreading  : — 

First,  The  patent  to  Maryland  had  been  granted  to  Lord  Baltimore,  and 
he  was  not  only  a  competitor,  but  an  Englishman, — a  name  that  the  Dutch 
were  fast  learning  to  regard  as  another  title  for  formidable  rival  in  commerce, 
however  friendly  they  might  be  as  allies  in  arms. 

Second,  The  Patroons  had  already  grown  powerful  enough  to  dispute  the 
raluable  fur  trade  with  the  agents  of  the  West  India  Company. 

Third,  Quarrels  had  grown  up  between  Minuit  and  the  inhabitants  of 
New  Amsterdam,  ending  in  his  recall  and  the  appointment  of  the  feeble  and 
despicable  Wouter  van  Twiller. 

The  English  had  no  intentions  of  allowing  the  Dutch  to  keep  the  Island 


88  CHARACTER    OF   GUSTAVUS  ADOLPHUS. 

of  Manhattan,  or  plant  their  stakes  very  deep  in  any  portion  of  its  neighbor- 
hood. On  Minuit's  return  to  Holland,  he  stopped  at  the  port  of  Plymouth, 
where  his  ship  was  detained  by  the  English  ;  and  not  long  after,  an  English 
vessel  appeared  in  New  York  harbor,  which,  in  defiance  of  the  authorities, 
and  the  menaces  of  cannon  sailed  up  the  Hudson. 

Growing  jealous  of  the  rapidly  increasing  emigration  of  the  Puritans  in 
New  England,  and  foreseeing  their  encroachments,  the  Dutch  began  to  make 
good  their  claim  to  the  shores  of  the  Connecticut  river  which  they  had  dis- 
covered, and  thereby  claimed  by  the  same  right  they  had  to  those  of  the 
Hudson.  They  secured  the  Indian  title  to  the  site  of  Hartford,  where  they 
erected  a  fort'  and  were  strengthening  a  settlement.  Only  a  few  months 
later,  however,  some  of  the  members  of  the  Plymouth  colony  raised  a  block- 
house at  Windsor,  across  the  river ;  and  two  years  later,  Hooker  and  Haynes 
laid  the  foundations  of  the  colony  of  Connecticut,  which  was  afterwards  to 
become  the  eagle' s-nest  of  the  Republic. 

It  required  no  prophetic  eye  to  see  that  the  Dutch  settlement  at  Hart- 
ford, would  soon  melt  away  before  the  advancing  and  irresistible  tide  of  Ply- 
mouth colonization. 

Gustavus  Adolphus. — This  greatest  of  all  Scandinavian  monarchs, — and, 
we  had  almost  said,  the  greatest  of  all  Scandinavian  men — had  early  given  his 
attention  to  the  subject  of  American  commerce  and  colonization ;  and  had 
not  his  chivalric  devotion  to  the  great  principles  of  the  Reformation  drawn 
him  into  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  he  would  probably  have  cut  his  name  deep 
into  our  colonial  history.  Enriched  by  the  rarest  qualities  of  mind  and 
heart ;  illuminated  by  all  culture  ;  liberalized  by  study,  travel,  and  intimate 
intercourse  with  the  great  statesmen  of  his  times ;  seeing  a  better  future 
for  men  and  for  nations,  and  greeting  with  enthusiasm  the  new  light  that  was 
breaking  over  mankind,  he  saw,  with  the  eye  of  a  prophet,  the  tendencies 
which  were  drifting  the  energies  of  Europe  towards  the  new  regions  of  the 
West.  Inheriting  the  inspirations  of  courage  and  freedom  which  hovered 
over  the  waters,  and  dwelt  among  the  wild  crags  of  the  North,  nothing 
less  than  the  championship  of  liberty,  humanity,  and  truth  could  satisfy  the 
aspirations  of  his  great  soul.  The  grandeur  of  his  schemes  ;  the  broad  fields 
they  were  to  cover,  and  the  influence  he  was  to  put  forth  upon  the  affairs  of 
Europe,  seemed  to  be  in  an  inverse  ratio  to  the  poverty  of  his  resources  and 
the  restricted  limits  of  his  dominions.  But  he  was  one  of  those  men  who 
have  all  along  the  line  of  history  appeared  at  intervals,  to  show  how  much 
grander  is  the  empire  of  mind  than  the  sway  of  brute  force — how  vaster  the 
conceptions  of  genius  than  the  edicts  of  arbitrary  power — how  men  in  all  age? 
instinctively  bow  to  the  majesty  of  true  greatness. 

Let  my  young  readers  recall  the  fine  examples  we  have  of  all  this  in  the 
records  of  men,  as  well  as  of  nations.  Perched  like  an  eagle  on  his  eyrie, 
from  immemorable  time  Switzerland  has  preserved  her  mountain  freedom. 
Even  the  genius  of  Sir  Walter  Scott  could  never  have  invested  the  Highlands 


PLAN  FOR  A    GREAT  SWEDISH  COLONY.  89 

d(  Scotland  with  so  magic  a  charm,  had  he  not  listened  in  his  youth  to  the 
tales  of  heroism  and  romance  which  are  embalmed  in  her  traditional  Border 
Minstrelsy.  One  of  the  last  lessons  we  learn  from  experience,  is  one  of  the 
first  that  should  be  taught  in  the  school — that  it  is  quality  and  not  quantity 
that  determines  results.  The  spirit  of  true  achievement  is  the  spirit  of  the 
universe  ;  and  that  must  be  the  spirit  of  real  power.  Despotism  grows  feeble 
in  the  presence  of  one  indomitable  soul.  The  wronged  Hagar,  as  she  turns  her 
back  upon  the  outrage  of  her  home,  and  plunges  off  into  the  desert  with  that 
lion  boy  on  her  shoulders,  has  made  a  finer  subject  for  the  pencil  of  the 
Frenchman  than  the  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold.  The  imprisoned  cobbler 
wrote  the  imperishable  guide-book  to  eternal  life  in  Bedford  jail.  Homer 
sang  the  greatest  of  epics,  to  get  his  bread,  before  the  gates  of  a  hundred 
cities  that  afterwards  fought  for  the  honor  of  having  given  him  birth.  Twenty 
centuries  later,  his  brother  Dante  filled  the  Dark  Ages  with  the  light  of  the 
Divine  Comedy  as  he  trode  his  painful  way  into  exile  from  his  beloved  Flor- 
ence ;  and  four  hundred  years  had  to  go  by  before  the  crime  of  his  exile  could 
be  expiated  by  the  genius  of  her  artists,  and  the  adoration  of  her  people. 
The  only  portions  of  history  worth  reading  are  made  up  of  those  deeds  tha 
spring  from  the  chivalry  of  noble  souls — of  words  that  voice  the  hopes,  and 
foretell  the  triumphs  of  the  brave  and  the  suffering. 

Of  such  was  Gustavus  Adolphus,  one  of  the  earliest  benefactors  of  the 
United  States.  Like  all  other  great  rulers,  he  clustered  great  men  around 
him.  Tormented  by  no  pitiful  jealousy  of  superiority  in  his  counsellors, 
and  rejoicing  in  their  greatness  as  much  as  in  his  own,  he  found  in  them 
allies,  where  smaller  men  would  have  discerned  only  rivals.  While  the 
Mayflower  was  struggling  through  that  winter  sea,  William  Wesselinx,  a 
Netherlander,  who  had  known  the  Pilgrims,  and  what  sort  of  people  they 
were,  was  on  his  way  to  the  court  of  Gustavus  Adolphus.  He  spread 
before  the  candid  mind  of  the  Prince  the  fruits  of  all  his  observa- 
tions of  the  commercial  movements  of  his  time.  Monopolies  were  the 
order  of  the  day.  He  drew  up  a  plan  for  the  charter  of  a  great  commer- 
cial Company  for  planting  colonies,  and  carrying  on  traffic  anywhere  beyond 
the  Straits  of  Gibraltar.  On  the  recommendation  of  the  King,  the  States 
of  Sweden  confirmed  the  incorporation,  and  the  sovereign  became  the 
first  subscriber  in  the  sum  of  $400,000 — money  of  the  State,  because  he 
intended  to  have  all  his  subjects  become  as  much  interested  in  it  as  himself. 
Subscriptions  were  invited  from  all  the  great  cities  outside  of  his  dominions. 
The  charter  reads  more  like  an  illuminated  State  paper  than  an  act  to  incor- 
porate a  monopoly.  The  colonies  to  be  founded  were  to  be  governed  by  the 
Royal  Council  of  Sweden ;  for  '  politics  lie  beyond  the  profession  of  mer- 
chants.' Their  commercial  and  agricultural  affairs  were  not  to  be  interfered 
with,  while  their  political  institutions  were  to  be  determined  by  statesmanship. 
Colonists  were  invited  from  all  Europe ;  '  free  men,  and  not  slaves,  since 
they  cost  a  great  deal,  labor  with  reluctance,  and  soon  perish  from  hard  usage.' 


9Q  THE  SWEDES  AND  FINNS   ON   THE  DELAWARE. 

And  now  we  have  the  grand  announcement,  which  was  one  of  the  eailiest 
and  certainly  the  greatest  declaration  those  times  had  listened  to — 'The 
Swedish  nation  is  laborious  and  intelligent,  and  surely  we  shall 

GAIN    MORE    BY    FREE    PEOPLE    WITH   WIVES     AND    CHILDREN.'        The    Colonies 

to  be  founded  were  to  '  afford  security  to  the  honor  of  wives  and  daughters ; 
refuge  for  fugitives  from  persecution  and  bigotry ;  A  blessing  to  the  com- 
mon man,  and  to  the  whole  Protestant  world.'  So  much  importance 
did  Gustavus  attach  to  the  kind  of  colonization  he  proposed  to  promote,  and 
so  ample  was  his  conception  of  its  character  and  scope,  that  he  wrote  these 
words  :  '  I  hope  it  may  prove  an  advantage  to  all  oppressed  Christen- 
dom.' 

If  the  genius  which  presided  over  American  fortunes  did  not  on  that  fair 
morning  see  the  sunlight  breaking  through  the  thick  mists  that  hung  over  the 
American  shores,  Gustavus  Adolphus  did.  His  scheme  was  fairly  under 
way,  and  a  Swedish  colony  was  to  be  founded.  But  the  first  check  had  to 
be  given  to  the  roused  energy  of  the  Papal  power.  Alarmed  at  the  progress 
of  the  new  ideas  which  threatened  the  overthrow  of  colossal  Rome,  that 
\iad  so  long  held  the  nations  in  her  grasp,  the  Catholic  powers  of  the 
continent  had  rallied  to  crush  out  the  intellectual  rebellion  that  had  risen 
to  assert  the  freedom  of  the  individual  man.  The  Thirty  Years  War  was  to 
determine  the  issue,  after  the  longest  and  one  of  the  hardest  struggles  ever 
maintained  to  disenthrall  the  human  race.  Gustavus  threw  all  his  energies 
into  the  crusade  to  assert  the  rights  of  conscience,  and  establish  religious  tol- 
eration in  Germany  by  his  sword. 

But  the  noble  Prince  did  not  live  to  carry  out  his  scheme  of  colonization. 
In  commending  it,  a  few  days  before  his  death,  to  all  the  people  of  Germany, 
he  declared  it  to  be  '  the  jewel  of  his  kingdom.' 

He  was  foully  murdered  after  winning  the  hard-fought  field  of  Liitzen,  which 
was  one  of  the  most  glorious  triumphs  for  humanity  ever  achieved.  But  his 
noble  thought  was  not  to  die.  Oxenstiern,  the  great  Chancellor  of  Sweden, 
who  had  embraced  it  with  all  the  warmth  of  his  nature,  and  cast  over  it  all  the 
illumination  of  his  statesmanship,  still  attempted  its  consummation.  The  in- 
dependent city  of  Frankfort,  a  powerful  republic  in  itself,  confirmed  the  Swed- 
ish charter ;  and  the  attention  of  the  Low  Countries,  and  a  considerable  part  of 
the  Germanic  world,  was  drawn  to  the  contemplation  of  the  scheme  of  Ameri- 
can commerce  and  colonization.  Nor  was  all  this  without  effect :  if  Gustavus 
Adolphus  was  the  god-father  of  the  State  of  Delaware,  it  might  call  itself  the 
child  of  Oxenstiern. 

The  Swedes  a?id  Fin?is  on  the  Delaware,  1637-8. — A  large  portion  of  the 
tapitai  subscribed  for  the  colony  had  been  diverted  from  its  purpose  for  car- 
rying on  the  struggle  in  Germany  :  but  the  project  was  not  to  perish.  Minuit, 
the  deposed  Governor  of  New  Netherland,  proffered  his  services  to  the 
Swedes,  who  fitted  out  for  him  two  vessels,  under  the  auspices  of  the  govern- 
ment.    If  the  colony  which  this  little  fleet  carried  was  small,  it  was  complete 


LORD  BALTIMORE  FOUNDS  MARYLAND.  9* 

Everything  necessary  was  furnished,  provision  being  made  for  religious,  a3 
well  as  secular  instruction.  The  expedition  passed  up'  the  Delaware  in  the 
spring  of  1638.  Friendly  intercourse  with  the  Indians  was  opened,  and  a 
purchase  made  of  the  great  tract  that  extends  from  the  southern  cape,  on  both 
sides  of  the  Delaware,  as  far  up  as  the  falls  at  Trenton.  They  commenced 
their  settlement  at  the  mouth  of  a  creek  within  the  limits  of  the  State  of  Dela- 
ware.    They  named  their  fort  after  Christiana,  the  girl  Queen  of  Sweden. 

The  impulse  given  resulted  in  larger  emigration,  chiefly  of  the  peasant 
classes  of  Sweden  and  Finland,  who  had  been  as  much  captivated  by  the  de- 
scriptions of  the  fertility  of  the  soil  and  the  beauty  of  the  climate,  as  adven- 
turers in  other  parts  of  Europe  had  been  by  the  dream  of  gold.  Every 
opportunity  to  reach  America  was  so  eagerly  seized,  that  multitudes  of  families 
were  unable  to  obtain  passage.  Their  settlements  dotted  the  banks  of  the 
Delaware  even  as  far  as  the  neighborhood  of  Philadelphia,  before  the  world 
had  ever  heard  of  William  Penn.  The  whole  region  was  known  as  New 
Sweden  ;  and  to  these  emigrants  the  existence  of  the  State  of  Delaware,  and 
the  first  establishment  of  Europeans  in  Pennsylvania,  were  due.  We  shall 
soon  see  how  their  settlements  on  the  upper  Delaware  afterwards  merged  into 
the  proprietaryship  of  Penn. 

The  Settlement  of  Maryland. — This  State  owes  its  existence  to  the  perse- 
cution of  the  Roman  Catholics  of  England  and  Ireland.  King  James  had 
said  that  he  would  '  harrie  the  Puritans  out  of  his  kingdom,'  for  non-conform- 
ity with  the  established  church  of  England ;  and  he  did  his  best  to  keep  his 
word.  The  Roman  Catholics  were  still  further  beyond  the  pale  of  royal  tole- 
ration, and  the  penalties  they  endured  were  more  extreme.  Suffering  under 
these  terrible  disabilities,  they  looked  to  America  as  the  only  place  of  refuge. 
Their  leader  was  George  Calvert,  who  through  his  great  talents  for  business 
and  administration,  with  his  large  liberality  of  spirit,  had  maintained  the  diffi- 
cult position  of  member  of  the  London  Company,  and  Catholic  Secretary  of 
State.  How  he  managed  to  retain  the  favor  of  the  King,  without  disloyalty  to 
his  faith,  was  best  known  to  himself.  But  he  stood  so  high  in  the  grace  of 
James,  that  in  162 1  he  was  created  an  Irish  peer,  with  the  title  of  Lord  Balti 
more. 

Lord  Baltimore  Goes  to  Virginia,  1628. — He  visited  the  Virginia  colony, 
with  the  hope  of  a  friendly  reception ;  but  he  found  them  as  intolerant  as  the 
church  party  of  England,  or  the  Puritans.  Leaving  Jamestown  in  disgust,  he 
started  for  the  north  of  the  Potomac  on  a  tour  of  examination  over  a  region 
very  little  known.  Here  he  was  so  well  satisfied  that  he  applied  for  a  royal 
patent  to  establish  a  colony ;  and  as  the  London  Company  was  no  longer 
in  existence,  Charles  L,  as  monarch  of  all  the  soil,  granted  his  request. 

The  Charter  for  Maryland,  April  25,  1632. — In  the  meantime,  Calvert 
bad  died;  bu<  on  the  20th  of  June,  two  months  after  the  date  of  the  charter, 


92      BROAD    TOLERATION  OF   THE  MARYLAND    CHARTER. 

the  patent  was  issued  to  Cecil  his  son  and  heir.  The  territory  extended 
along  both  shores  of  Chesapeake  Bay,  from  the  30th  to  the  40th  degree  ot 
latitude,  the  western  boundary  being  the  line  of  the  Potomac.  It  was  the 
most  liberal  charter  that  had  ever  issued  from  the  British  Government.  It 
had  been  drawn  up  by  Lord  Baltimore's  own  hand,  and  the  limits  and  condi- 
tions were  fixed  by  himself,  after  a  full  knowledge  of  the  territory,  from 
personal  exploration.  The  colony  was  to  remain  independent  of  the  Crown, 
and  perfect  equality  in  civil  and  religious  rights  was  secured  to  every  settler, 
regardless  of  sect,1 — one  unhappy  exception  alone  being  made,  against  all  whc 
doubted  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  or  did  not  accept  the  Bible  as  a  divine 
revelation.3  No  laws  could  be  imposed,  nor  taxes  levied  upon  the  colonists, 
except  by  a  majority  of  the  freemen,  or  their  representatives. 

The  establishment  of  such  a  colony,  under  such  auspices,  is  worth  con- 
templation.8 On  the  face  of  the  earth,  hitherto,  nothing  of  the  kind  had 
existed.  It  antedated  by  some  years  the  next  similar  announcement  which 
was  made  by  Roger  Williams  in  Rhode  Island.  The  fruits  of  the  large  views 
of  the  first  Lord  Baltimore  were  soon  reaped.  Emigrants  tlowed  in  from 
Europe,  and  many  victims  of  English  persecution  flocked  to  Maryland,  to 
find  liberty,  protection,  and  peace.  It  was  the  only  spot  on  the  globe  where 
such  nearly  absolute  civil  and  religious  freedom  had  been  guaranteed  by  a 
constitution  which  gave  birth  to  a  new  State.  It  was  the  first  clear  enuncia- 
tion made  of  the  great  principle  which  was  afterwards  to  inspire  every  consti- 
tution and  Bill  of  Rights  that  was  to  be  promulgated  on  this  soil.  The  glad 
news  went  through  the  European  nations.  This  was  freedom,  indeed.  Nor 
will  the  historian  hereafter  arise,  whose  eye  will  not  catch  the  first  herald  fires 
of  freedom  that  blazed  from  the  sightly  hill  of  Baltimore,  now  so  fitly  crowned 
by  a  monument  to  the  Father  of  his  country. 

The  Maryland  charter  was  granted  a  hundred  years  before  the  birth  of 
Washington ;  and  while  the  hours  of  that  century  were  slowly  gliding  away, 
the  example  of  toleration  displayed  in  Lord  Baltimore's  constitution,  was  put- 
ting forth  its  benign  influence  upon  the  spirit  that  was  to  be  infused  into  the 
statesmanship  of  the  world. 

1  Calvert  deserves  to  be  ranked  among  the  most  given  disturbance  to  any  person  in  Maryland  for  mat- 
wise  and  benevolent  law-givers  of  all  ages.  He  was  the  ter  of  religion  ;  that  the  colonists  enjoyed  freedom  of 
first  in  the  history  of  the  Christian  world  to  seek  for  re-  conscience,  not  less  than  freedom  of  person  and  estate, 
ligious  security  and  peace  by  the  practice  of  justice,  and  as  amply  as  any  people  of  any  place  of  the  world.  The 
not  by  the  exercise  of  power ;  to  plan  the  establishment  disfranchised  friends  of  prelacy  from  Massachusetts, 
of  popular  institutions  with  the  enjoyment  of  the  liberty  and  the  Puritans  from  Virginia,  were  welcomed  to  equal 
of  conscience  ;  to  advance  the  career  of  civilization  by  liberty  of  conscience  and  political  rights  in  the  Roman 
recognizing  the  rightful  equality  of  all  Christian  sects.  Catholic  province  of  Maryland. — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  pp. 
The  asylum  of  Papists  was  the  spot  where,  in  a  remote  256-7. 

corner  of  the  world,  on  the  banks  of  rivers,  which,  as  8  Every  other  country  in  the  world  had  persecuting 

yet,  had  hardly  been  explored,  the  mild  forbearance  of  laws  ;  through  the  benign  administration  of  the  govern 

a  proprietary  adopted  religious  freedom  as  the  basis  of  ment  of  that  province,  no  person  professing  to  believ* 

the  State. — Bancroft,  vol.  1.  p.  214.  in  Jesus  Christ  was  permitted  to  be  molested  on  a« 

2  The  clause  for  liberty  in  Maryland  extended  only  count  of  religion.  Under  the  munificence  and  superin 
to  Christians,  and  was  introduced  by  the  proviso,  that  tending  mildness  of  Baltimore,  the  dreary  wilderness 
1  whatsoever  person  shall  blaspheme  God,  or  shall  deny  was  soon  quickened  with  the  swarming  life  and  activity 
or  reproach  the  Holy  Trinity,  or  any  of  the  three  per-  of  prosperous  settlements  ;  the  Roman  Catholics,  who 
sons  thereof,  shall  be  punished  with  death.'  *  *  *  were  oppressed  by  the  laws  of  England,  were  sure  to 
But  the  design  of  the  law  of  Maryland  was  undoubt-  find  a  peaceful  asylum  in  the  quiet  harbors  of  the 
edly  to  protect  freedom  of  .conscience  ;  and,  some  years  Chesapeake;  and  there,  too,  Protestants  were  shel* 
after  it  had  been  confirmed,  the  apologist  of  Lord  Bal-  tered  against  Protestant  intolerance. — Bancroft,  vol.  i. 
timore  could  assert,  that  his  government,  in  conformity  p.  248. 

ivith  his  strict  and  repeated  injunctions,  had  never 


CECTL,    SECOND    LORD    BALTIMORE. 


DEMOCRATIC  GOVERNMENT  ORGANIZED.  93 

Emigration  to  Maryland,  1633.— On  the  second  of  December,  nineteen 
months  after  the  date  of  Lord  Baltimore's  charter,  his  son,  Leonard  Calvert, 
brother  of  Cecil,  embarked  for  Maryland,  commissioned  as  Governor  of  the 
province,  with  a  colony,  made  up  chiefly  of  the  Roman  Catholic  faith.  They 
sailed  up  the  Potomac  as  far  as  Mount  Vernon — that  charmed  spot  which  seemed 
to  have  a  magnetic  power  of  drawing  men  to  it,  whilst  reserving  its  possession 
for  Washington  alone.  But  they  were  not  to  settle  there.  Floating  back  to 
the  mouth  of  the  river,  they  landed  at  an  inviting  site  on  an  estuary  of  the 
Chesapeake,  and  in  the  month  of  April,  by  friendly  treaty  with  the  Indians, 
purchased  a  village,1  and  laid  the  foundation  of  a  town  which  they  named 
St.  Mary,  after  the  reigning  Queen  of  England.  It  had  been  an  honest  bar- 
gain ;  for  integrity  and  kindness  had  won  the  friendship  of  the  natives,  who 
from  that  hour  preserved  their  loyalty  with  more  than  Christian  faith — as  that 
desecrated  name  has  been  so  commonly  applied.2 

Democratic  Government  Organized  in  Maryland,  March  8,  1635. — On 
this  day  the  first  legislative  Assembly  met  at  St.  Mary.  It  was  a  pure  democ- 
racy, for  the  Legislature  consisted  of  the  whole  body  of  freemen.  Thus  their 
laws  were  made,  and  their  government  carried  on  for  four  years ;  when  it  be- 
came representative  for  greater  convenience.  The  delegates  put  forth  a 
Declaration  of  Rights,  constituted  themselves  a  Commonwealth,  defined  the 
powers  of  the  proprietor,  planted  themselves  upon  the  constitutional  rights  of 
Englishmen,  and  ever  after  adhered  to  the  principles  of  independence  and 
civil  liberty.     On  that  day  the  commonwealth  of  Maryland  had  its  birth. 

The  Connecticut  Colony,  1632. — With  a  desire  of  consolidating  their  claims 
to  the  lands  bordering  on  Long  Island  Sound,  in  connection  with  the 
government  of  New  Netherland,  Minuit  had  early  advised  the  Puritans  of 
Massachusetts  to  abandon  their  barren  and  rocky  soil,  and  settle  on  the 
banks  of  the  Connecticut.8  A  few  years  later — 1631 — a  chief  of  the 
Mohegans,  who  were  carrying  on  a  bitter  war  with  the  Pequots  on  the  Thames 
river,  forty  miles  east  of  the  Connecticut,  had  sent  messengers,  inviting  the 
English  on  Massachusetts  Bay,  to  come  and  settle  in  that  valley.  It  would 
serve  as  a  barrier  between  him  and  his  foes,  and  he  proffered  his  alliance. 
The  motives  of  all  these  parties  were  clearly  understood,  and  the  New 
England  settlers  chose  staying  where  they  were.  • 

1  Of  Calvert's  settlement  at  the  Indian  town  of  Yoa-  maize;  the  warriors  of  the  tribe  instructed  the  hunts- 

comoco,  and  its  purchase  from  the  natives,  Bancroft,  men  how  rich  were  the  forests  of  America  in  game,  and 

vol.  i.  p.  247,  says  :  'Mutual  promises  of  friendship  and  joined  them  in  the  chase.     And,  as  the  season  of  the 

peace  were  made,  so  that,  upon  the  27th  day  of  ^Iarch,  year  invited  to  the  pursuits  of  agriculture,  and   the 

1634,  the  Catholics  took  quiet  possession  of  the  little  English  had  come  into  possession  of  ground  already 

Elace,  and  religious  liberty  obtained  a  home,  its  only  subdued,  they  were  able,  at  once,  to  possess  cornfields 
ome  in  the  wide  world,  at  the  humble  village  which  and  gardens,  and  prepare  the  wealth  of  successful  hus- 
bore  the  name  of  St.  Mary.'  bandry.  Virginia,  from  its  surplus  produce,  could  fur- 
The  ship  which  brought  Leonard  Calvert  and  his  nish  a  temporary  supply  of  food,  and  all  kinds  of  do- 
two  hundred  people  was  named  Ark  and  Dove,  every  mestic  cattle.  No  sufferings  were  endured  ;  no  fears 
way  a  fitting  name  !  of  want  were  excited  ;  the  foundation  of  the  colony  of 
a  Three  days  after  the  landing  of  Calvert,  the  Ark  Maryland  was  peacefully  and  happily  laid.  Within 
and  Dove  anchored  in  the  harbor.  Si-  John  Harvey  six  months  it  had  advanced  more  than  Virginia  had 
»oon  arrived  on  a  visit ;  the  native  chiefs,  also,  came  to  done  in  as  many  years.— Bancroft,  vol.  i.  p.  247. 
Welcome  or  to  watch  the  emigrants,  and  were  so  well  s  The  spelling  of  the  Indian  word  Qucn-eh-ta-cutt 
received  that  they  resolved  to  give  perpetuity  to  their  signifying  the  long  river,  gave  the  sanction  to  the  name 
league  of  amity  with  the  English.  The  Indian  women  and  its  orthography  in  English. 
taught  the  wives  of  th  -.  new-comers  to  make  bread  of 


94         ESTABLISHMENT  OF   THE   CONNECTICUT  COLONY. 

Mr.  Winslow  Visits  the  Valley  of  the  Connecticut,  1632. — This  broad- 
minded,  sagacious  man,  preferring  to  trust  his  own  judgment,  visited  the  valley 
of  the  Connecticut,  and  determined  to  colonize  it.  In  the  meantime, 
learning  their  intentions,  the  Dutch  had  purchased  the  land  where  Hartford  now 
stands,  and  planted  two  cannon  on  their  fort,  resolved  to  dispute  the  passage 
of  the  English  up  the  river.  But  the  Plymouth  Governor  had'  entrusted  the 
expedition  to  Captain  William  Holmes,  who  had  put  his  company  on  board, 
with  the  frame  of  a  house,  and  other  appliances  necessary  for  starting  a 
settlement.  Armed  with  a  commission  from  Plymouth,  he  went  up  the  river, 
heedless  of  the  Dutch  guns ;  and  landing  at  the  spot  where  Windsor  now 
stands,  went  to  work  and  put  up  his  house.  The  next  year  the  Dutch  sent 
a  company  of  seventy  men  to  drive  him  out.  But  meeting  with  a  warm  re- 
ception, words  were  substituted  for  bullets  :  the  Dutch  were  first  talked  into 
good  humor,  and  finally  into  friendship.  There  was  not  a  fairer  spot  on  the 
continent  than  the  green  bank  of  the  Connecticut ;  and  Holmes  worked  so 
vigorously,  that  the  next  season  he  announced  to  his  friends  in  Massachu- 
setts that  he  was  ready  to  receive  accessions  to  his  little  colony. 

A  Winter  Journey  through  the  Wilderness,  Oct.  25,  1635. — We  now  reach 
one  of  the  most  extraordinary  expeditions  of  which  we  have  any  knowledge. 
On  the  25th  of  October,  1635,  a  little  party  of  sixty  men,  women,  and 
children,  with  their  cattle,  and  all  their  earthly  possessions,  started  out 
through  the  wilderness  on  a  journey  of  a  hundred  miles  for  their  new  home. 
They  were  one  month  on  the  road, — making  their  way  as  best  they  could 
through  dense  forest  and  dismal  swamps, — till  they  finally  reached  the  frozen 
river,  and  a  settlement  wrapped  in  a  winding  sheet  of  deep  snow.  It  was  a 
hard,  long  winter.  They  all  suffered  with  hunger;  but  for  the  milk  of  the 
cows  they  had  brought  with  them,  their  children  must  all  have  perished. 
Many  of  their  cattle  died.  A  small  vessel  that  had  been  sent  to  them,  laden 
with  food,  was  wrecked  on  the  coast.  At  last  their  only  food  was  slender 
supplies  of  corn  from  the  Indians,  and  the  acorns  they  could  gather.  Those 
of  them  least  able  to  endure  these  terrible  privations,  made  their  way  to  the 
fort  erected  at  Saybrook,1  where  they  embarked  for  Boston. 

But  the  settlement  was  to  remain  and  flourish.  At  the  opening  of  spring, 
supplies  reached  the  settlers  :  they  erected  a  little  meeting-house  ;  organized 
their  first  court ;  opened  the  soil  to  the  sun ;  and  the  banks  of  that  lovely  river 
began  to  blush  under  the  culture  of  the  Anglo-Saxon. 

Progress  of  the  Connecticut  Colony. — We  here  strike  upon  names  that 
have  filled  large  spaces  in  history.  Henry  Vane,  Hugh  Peters,  and  a  son  of 
Governor  Winthrop  had  reached  Boston  as  Commissioners  for  the  Proprietors 
of  Connecticut ;  and  continuing  their  voyage  to  the  mouth  of  the  river,  had 
built  a  fort  and  made  a  permanent  settlement  at  Saybrook.     The  results  which 

1  The  Council  of  Plymouth  had  granted,  in  1630,  the     Lord  Brooke,  and  John  Hampden  ;  and  thus  the  fort 
soil  of  Connecticut  to  the  Earl  of  Warwicke,  who  the     had  its  name,  Saybrook. 
next  year  transferred  the  grant  to  Lord   Say-and-Seal, 


DARING  AND  SUFFERINGS   OF   THE  SETTLERS.  95 

followed,  however,  bear  little  comparison  in  importance  with  a  new  expedi- 
tion that  started  from  Boston  in  June  of  the  same  year,  'by  the  overland  route,' 
under  the  guidance  of  Rev.  Thomas  Hooker,1  who  was  honored  as  '  the  light 
of  the  western  churches' — with  other  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  their  families, 
and  settlers  to  the  number  of  one  hundred,  with  their  flocks  and  herds,  their 
utensils  and  all  their  worldly  goods.  It  was  a  long  and  toilsome  journey.  As 
their  provisions  gave  out,  they  lived  chiefly  upon  wild  berries,  and  the  milk  of 
the  cows.  But  they  went  on,  light-hearted ;  and  on  the  4th  of  July — that 
wonderful  day  in  our  history — they  saw  the  clear  waters  of  the  Connecticut 
sweeping  by  the  banks  of  Hartford,  gleaming  in  the  midday  sun.  The  little 
church  was  ready  for  the  great  preacher,  and  there  he  administered  the 
communion  of  the  Lord's  Supper  to  his  heroic  and  reverent  congregation. 
With  a  spirit  of  independence  which  characterized  those  early  settlers,  each 
looked  about  for  himself;  and  they- soon  dotted  the  region  with  their  little 
settlements.  One  was  Wethersfield,  four  miles  below ;  another  Springfield, 
twenty  miles  above  Hartford  ;  five  in  all — weak,  unprotected,  but  bound  toge- 
ther by  the  strongest  ties  the  earth  ever  knows  :  all  sublimated  by  a  common 
reliance  upon  their  Almighty  ally  for  protection. 

With  the  exception  of  the  first  colony  of  Plymouth,  we  hardly  find  a  par- 
allel to  the  daring,  and  apparent  desperation  of  these  first  settlers  of  Con- 
necticut. On  the  east  lay  the  powerful  tribe  of  the  Pequots,  bloody  and  re- 
morseless savages,  now  freshly  enraged  at  the  apparent  alliance  of  these 
English  intruders  with  their  worst  enemies,  the  Mohegans  of  the  Connecticut 
valley ;  and  their  old  and  powerful  foes  the  Narragansets,  who  were  friendly 
to  the  Plymouth  settlers.  Resolute  upon  their  extermination,  the  Pequots 
stealthily  plotted  their  ruin.  If  a  settler  straggled  too  far  into  the  forest,  he 
was  pierced  by  an  arrow.  Unguarded  children  playing  at  any  distance  from 
their  houses,  were  kidnapped.  One  of  the  trading  vessels  on  the  Sound  was 
seized  and  plundered,  and  the  captain  killed ;  and  on  the  outskirts  of  every 
settlement  lurked  the  wily  foe.  Matters  were  made  worse  by  an  unsuccessful 
attempt  of  the  Puritans  of  Massachusetts,  who  sent  a  small  expedition  into 
the  Pequot  territory,  which  only  inflamed  the  hostility  of  the  savages,  who 
attempted,  and  thought  they  had  secured,  the  co-operation  of  the  Narragansets 
in  their  scheme  for  a  general  massacre  of  the  English  settlers. 

Roger  Williams  Saves  the  Colonists. — Help  came  from  a  quarter  least  ex- 
pected, and  least  deserved.     It  was  reserved  for  Roger  Williams — an  exile 

1  Hooker,  of  vast  endowments,  a  strong  will,  and  had  awaited  him  as  one  wave  follows  another,'  ever 

an  energetic  mind  ;  ingenuous  in  his  temper,  and  open  serenely  blessed  with  '  a  glorious  peace  of  soul ; '  fixed 

in  his  professions ;  trained  to  benevolence  by  the  disci-  in  his  trust  in  Providence,  and  in  his  adhesion  to  that 

pline  of  affliction  ;   versed  in  tolerance  by  his  refuge  in  cause  of  advancing  civilization,  which  he  cherished  al- 

Holland  ;  choleric,  yet  gentle  in  his  affections  ;  firm  in  ways,  even  while  it  remained  to  him  a  mystery.     This 

his  faith,  yet  readily  yielding  to  the  power  of  reason  ;  was  he,  whom,  for  his  abilities   and  services,  his  con- 

the  peer  of  the  reformers,  without  their  harshness  ;  the  temporaries  placed  '  in  the  first  rank  'of  men  ;  praising 

devoted  apostle  to  the  humble  and  the  poor,  severe  to-  him  as  '  the  one   rich  pearl,  with  which   Europe  more 

wards  the  proud,  mild  in  his  soothings  of  a  wounded  than  repaid  America  for  the  treasures  from  her  coast' 

spirit,  glowing  with  the  raptures  of  devotion,  and  kind-  The  people  to  whom  Hooker  ministered  had  preceded 

ling  with  the  messages  of  redeeming  love  ;    his  eye,  him  ;   as  he  landed,  they  crowded  about  him  with  their 

voice,  gesture,  and  whole  frame  animate  with  the  living  welcome.     '  Now  I  live  ' — exclaimed   he,  as  with  open 

vigor  of  hea  t-felt  religion  ;  public-spirited  and  lavishly  arms  he  embraced  them — '  now  I  live,  if  ye  stand  fast 

charitable;    nd,  '  though  persecutions  and  banishments  in  the  Lord.' — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  p.  365. 


96  ROGER  WILLIAMS  FOUNDS  RHODE  ISLAND. 

from  Massachusetts,  but  now  a  guest  of  the  Narraganset  tribe,  to  defeat  the 
infernal  alliance.  His  great  heart  could  harbor  no  revenge  against  men  ot 
his  own  blood,  though  they  had  driven  him  out  from  their  protection.  Know- 
ing that  the  Massachusetts  Bay  colonists  were  doomed,  without  this  treaty 
could  be  broken  up,  he  perilled  his  life  in  an  open  canoe  on  Narraganset  Bay, 
in  the  midst  of  a  storm,  to  reach  the  head-quarters  of  Miantonomah,  the  great 
Narraganset  sachem.  He  boldly  entered  the  cabin  at  Newport  where  the 
ambassadors  of  the  Pequot  tribe  were  holding  their  council  with  the  Narra- 
ganset chiefs.  The  ferocious  Pequots  sprang  forward  to  seize  him,  threat- 
ening him  with  death.  But  the  intrepid  Williams  appealed  to  the  hospitality 
of  Miantonomah,  who  gave  him  audience  and  protection.  For  three  days  he 
argued  with  these  tierce  men.  He  had  learned  much  of  their  language  ;  but 
what  his  tongue  failed  to  utter,  was  accomplished  by  the  majesty  of  his  man- 
ner, and  the  greatness  of  his  spirit.  He  broke  up  the  alliance  ;  and  when  the 
Pequots  had  left  the  island,  he  not  only  sealed  the  friendship  of  the  Narra- 
gansets,  but  persuaded  the  noble  Miantonomah  to  make  war  on  his  savage 
neighbors.  Thus  was  the  bloody  design  of  the  savages  defeated,  and  the 
infant  colonies  saved.  No  wonder  good  men  love  the  name  of  Roger  Wil- 
liams ;  the  saviour  of  all  the  other  colonies  was  worthy  to  become  the  founder 
of  Rhode  Island — the  first  commonwealth  established  on  these  shores,  which 
raised  the  standard  not  only  of  toleration,  but  of  protection  for  liberty  of 
conscience,  for  all  men,  regardless  of  creeds. 

First  Indian  War,  June  5,  1637. — The  failure  of  their  murderous  scheme 
only  enraged  the  remorseless  Pequots.  They  renewed  their  depredations  to 
such  an  extent,  that  the  next  year  the  settlers  on  the  Connecticut  declared 
war  against  them  ;  and  the  Plymouth  and  Massachusetts  colonies  joined  them 
in  the  common  cause.  The  English  settlements  had  all  received  accessions 
of  strength,  and  what  they  lacked  in  numbers  was  made  up  in  the  courage 
and  sagacity  of  the  allies  who  joined  the  expedition.  Captain  Mason,  the 
commandant  of  the  Saybrook  fort,  with  Captain  John  Underhill,  and  about 
eighty  men,  and  seventy  Indians  under  the  great  Uncas,  sailed  for  Narraganset 
Bay.  Miantonomah  received  them  with  his  two  hundred  warriors,  and  on  their 
march  to  the  Pequot  country,  volunteers  from  the  brave  Niantics  swelled 
their  numbers  to  upwards  of  five  hundred,  every  man  fully  equipped  for  his 
work  ;  Mason  and  Underhill  being  worthy  leaders. 

But  what  could  such  a  band  of  invaders  do  against  the  ferocious  Sassacus, 
the  terrible  Pequot  chief,  who  could  bring  two  thousand  warriors  into  the 
field  ?  He  felt  too  secure  :  for  the  subtlety  of  Miantonomah  outmatched 
his  formidable  hosts.  The  stronghold  of  Sassacus  was  on  the  Mystic  river, 
eight  miles  north-east  of  New  London, — he  could  defy  them.  But  before  day- 
light on  the  morning  of  the  5th  of  June,  the  invaders  suddenly  sprang  upon  the 
village,  and  before  the  sun  rose,  six  hundred  warriors,  with  their  wives  and 
children,  had  perished  by  bullets,  tomahawks,  or  fire.  Only  seven  escaped 
to  tell  the  story.     The  colonists  had  lost  but  two  of  their  numbers,  and  only  a 


FIRST  INDIAN  WAR.    EXTERMINATION  OF  THE  FEQUOTS.    97 

score  were  wounded.  To  complete  the  overthrow,  a  hundred  and  twenty 
men  from  Massachusetts,  under  the  gallant  Captain  Stoughton,  reached  the 
scene,  and  in  a  few  weeks  the  history  of  the  Pequots  was  ended. 

Lossing  in  his  History  gives  the  following  fine  description  of  the  scenes 
which  followed  :  '  The  terrified  Pequots  made  no  resistance,  but  fled  in  dis- 
may toward  the  wilderness  westward,  hotly  pursued  by  the  English.  Terrible 
was  the  destruction  in  the  path  of  the  pursuers.  Throughout  the  beautiful 
country  on  Long  Island  Sound,  from  Saybrook  to  New  Haven,  wigwams  and 
cornfields  were  destroyed,  and  helpless  women  and  children  were  slain.  With 
Sassacus  at  their  head,  the  Indians  flew  like  deer  before  the  hounds,  and 
finally  took  shelter  in  Sasco  swamp,  near  Fairfield,  where,  after  a  severe 
battle,  they  all  surrendered,  except  Sassacus  and  a  few  followers.  These 
fled  to  the  Mohawks,  where  the  sachem  was  treacherously  murdered,  and 
his  people  sold  into  slavery,  or  incorporated  with  other  tribes.  The  blow 
was  one  of  extermination,  relentless  and  cruel.  There  did  not  remain  a 
sannup  or  squaw,  a  warrior  or  child  of  the  Pequot  name.  t  A  nation  had 
disappeared  in  a  day.  The  New  England  tribes  were  filled  with  awe,  and  for 
forty  years  the  colonists  were  unmolested  by  them.' 

While  humanity  mourns  over  such  recitals,  the  cloud  turns  a  silver  lining 
to  the  light  of  history.  It  had  been  a  fearful  moment — but  the  holocaust  had 
purchased  salvation.  No  provocation  for  these  atrocities  had  been  offered  by 
the  settlers  of  New  England.  Every  acre  of  ground  they  had  taken  pos- 
session of  to  which  the  natives  pretended  to  lay  any  claim  whatever,  had  been 
bought  and  paid  for,  and  a  clear  title  executed.  No  effort  had  been  spared  to 
win  the  friendship  of  the  natives,  and  they  knew  that  the  colonists  were  not 
men  of  blood.  This  treatment  had  won  the  Mohawks  and  the  Narragansets. 
The  warriors  of  the  other  tribes  had  never  shown  a  lack  of  appreciation  of  the 
white  man's  friendship  ;  but  nothing  could  be  proof  against  the  ferocity  of  the 
Pequots.  They  cumbered  the  earth,  and  they  had  to  be  removed.  It  was  more 
an  act  of  Heaven,  than  the  deed  of  man.  A  few  words  further,  and  we  can 
leave  the  colony  of  Connecticut  marching  on  its  road  to  prosperity  and  power. 

New  a?id  Strong  Men  Join  the  Colony. — Tn  the  same  summer  which  wit- 
nessed the  overthrow  of  the  Pequots,  three  men  reached  Boston,  of  sucb 
rank  and  resources  as  made  the  Massachusetts  colonists  anxious  for  their 
settlement.  John  Davenport,  one  of  the  eminent  non-conformist  ministers  of 
London,  with  two  friends,  rich  merchants  and  true  men,  Theophilus  Eaton  and 
Edward  Hopkins,  had  determined  to  risk  their  fortunes  in  the  rising  world  of 
the  West.  But  they  soon  became  so  disgusted  with  the  bigotry  and  injustice  dis- 
played in  the  Hutchinson  affair — of  which  we  shall  soon  speak — that  they  chose 
rather  the  undisturbed  wilderness,  to  a  scene  of  strife.  In  the  autumn,  Eaton 
and  some  of  his  companions  explored  the  southern  coast  of  Connecticut,  and 
entering  Quinipiac — where  the  beautiful  city  of  New  Haven  now  stands— they 
chose  it  for  a  settlement,  and  passed  the  winter. 
7 


98         THE   CONNECTICUT  AND  NEW  HAVEN  COLONIES. 

New  Haven  Founded,  April  13,  1638. — Davenport  had  heard  the  favora- 
ble news  from  Eaton,  and  in  the  spring  he  joined  their  settlement  with  the 
rest  of  his  friends.  Under  the  broad  branches  of  a  great  oak — which  long 
afterwards  stood  at  the  intersection  of  George  and  College  streets — Davenport 
preached  his  first  sermon.  They  bought  the  land  from  the  Indians,  and  formed 
a  colony  after  their  own  liking — choosing,  as  they  said,  the  Bible  for  their  guide, 
and  drawing  up  what  they  called  their  Plantation  Covenant, — a  purely  religi- 
ous organization.  This  was  the  fair  start  they  made.  Of  course  they  were 
in  constant  intercourse  with  their  brethren  at  the  settlements  of  Hartford, 
Wethersfield,  Springfield,  and  Windsor ;  and  on  the  24th  of  the  following 
January,  they  met  in  convention  at  Hartford,  where  they  adopted  a  written 
Constitution.  It  provided  for  the  annual  election  of  a  Governor  and  legisla- 
ture by  the  whole  body  of  the  people,  only  one  oath  being  required — that  of 
allegiance  to  the  Commonwealth,  and  not  to  the  King  of  England.  This 
was  the  origin  of  the  Connecticut  Colony.  Its  union  with  the  New  Haven 
colony  was  not  complete  till  1665  ;  but  the  Commonwealth  of  Connecticut, 
which  was  founded  by  the  Hartford  convention,  was  maintained  for  a  hundred 
and  fifty  years. 

Progress  of  the  Puritan  Colonies. — The  death  of  James  L,  five  years  after 
the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims,  followed  by  the  accession  of  his  son,  Charles  I., 
whose  animosity  towards  the  non-conformists  was  even  greater  than  his 
father's,  brought  fresh  persecutions  to  the  Puritan  ministers  in  England. 
Their  best  preachers  were  either  imprisoned,  or  silenced.  Too  few  to  offer 
forcible  resistance,  no  road  opened  but  to  join  their  brethren  in  America,  and 
a  general  movement  for  emigration  began.  They  were  of  the  best  class  of 
men  and  women  then  living.  Men  the  most  learned,  women  the  most  resolute ; 
all  God-fearing  Christians  ;  many  in  good  circumstances,  some  of  them  rich  : 
accustomed  for  the  most  part  to  the  comforts  and  luxuries  then  enjoyed  by  the 
better  classes  of  Englishmen.  Every  one  of  them  made  old  England  poorei 
when  he  embarked,  and  New  England  richer  when  he  landed.  Each  was  an 
accession  of  strength.  No  temptations  were  held  out  to  ruined  men,  to  reck- 
less characters,  to  desperate  adventurers,  to  seekers  after  gold,  or  worldly 
glory.  They  were  the  best  of  Englishmen,  in  blood,  in  physical  training,  in 
power  of  endurance,  loftiness  of  purpose,  readiness  for  sacrifice.  Ripe  in 
learning,  stern  in  character,  inflexible  in  will,  republicans  by  conviction : 
bowing  to  no  sovereign  except  the  King  of  Kings.  It  was  picked  men  of 
Heaven's  own  choosing  that  settled  New  England  :  hence  their  strength  never 
could  be  measured  by  their  numbers.  Quantity  had  nothing  to  do  :  quality, 
everything.  The  bravest  and  best  spirits  of  England  would  not  endure  the 
insolence  of  the  minions  of  power,  and  they  loathed  the  corruption  and  de- 
bauchery of  the  court.  They  must  be  free — it  was  the  sole  condition  of  their 
existence.  Many  most  sterling  characters  were  now  starting  for  New  Eng- 
and ;  not  only  learned,  devout,  and  gifted  ministers,  but  broad-minded  states- 
men,   scholars,    school-teachers,    agriculturists,    mechanics,    inventors,   code 


aOHN   ENDICOTE, 


COLONY  OF  MASSACHUSETTS  BAY.  9$ 

makers — there  was  not  an  idle  man  among  them  when  they  left,  and  no  idle  man 
could  live  among  them  when  he  got  to  his  destination.  There  were  no  drones 
in  that  New  England  bee-hive.  There  was  order,  industry,  economy,  virtue, 
reverence  for  principle, — devotion  to  God.  There  was  no  baby-play  in  that 
business ;  there  was  no  frivolity,  no  intrigue,  no  avarice,  no  greed,  no  ambi- 
tion except  for  the  glory  of  founding  free  commonwealths. 

Charles  I.  was  as  anxious  to  get  rid  of  such  men,  as  they  were  to  get  rid 
of  him.  The  best  men  were  leaving.  Every  ship  was  an  ark  laden  with  men, 
women,  live-stock,  seeds,  and  agricultural  implements  for  planting  and  raising 
crops;  bibles,  school-books,  codes  of  law,  the  classics  of  the  Romans,  the 
Greeks  and  the  old  Hebrews  of  the  Orient — each  vessel  was  a  cosmos,  and 
could  have  started  a  new  world. 

The  Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  1628. — John  Endicot — one  of  the  im- 
perishable names — under  the  promise  of  a  charter,  sailed  with  a  hundred  emi- 
grants, every  one  of  whom  he  knew,  and  landed  at  Naumkeag,  where  he 
began  to  build  the  city  of  Salem,  which  was  so  long  to  be  the  seat  of  the 
foreign  commerce  of  New  England.  On  the  14th  of  March,  1629,  he  re- 
ceived his  charter,  entitled  :  *  The  Governor  and  Company  of  Massachusetts 
Bay  in  New  England.'  Four  months  later  he  was  followed  by  those  three 
strong,  godly  men — Higginson,  Skelton,  and  Bright — leading  two  hundred  emi- 
grants, their  neighbors  and  personal  friends :  they  founded  Charlestown, 
under  the  protection  of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  charter.  Many  good  men  in 
England  had  been  members  of  the  Corporation ;  and  on  the  first  of  September 
of  the  same  year,  they  all  met  at  Cambridge — the  old  seat  of  learning — and  made 
a  legal  transfer  of  their  charter  to  the  colonists.  This  gave  that  ample  secur- 
ity which  men  of  wealth  and  social  rank,  who  had  everything  to  lose,  required. 
John  Winthrop — another  honored  name  in  New  England  annals — was  chosen 
Governor  of  the  colony,  and  in  July,  1630,  he  sailed  with  three  hundred  fami- 
lies, for  Salem  j  with  him  also  Thomas  Dudley,  deputy  Governor,  and  a  coun- 
cil of  eighteen.  They  chose  the  neighborhood  of  Boston  for  settlement : 
and  shortly  the  new  Cambridge — the  child  of  the  old — and  the  first,  and  still  the 
greatest  seat  of  learning  in  the  Western  Hemisphere  rose,  with  Dorchester,  Rox- 
bury,  and  Watertown.  The  fame  of  a  wonderful  spring  of  pure  water  flowing 
out  from  one  of  the  three  hills  where  Boston  stands,  induced  them  to  build 
some  cottages  around  it.  Two  other  neighboring  hills  also  standing  on  the 
peninsula  of  Shawmut,  lifted  their  sightly  summits  over  the  surrounding  land 
and  waters  ;  hence  they  called  the  place  Tri-mountain.  And  thus  they  built, 
wiser  than  they  knew,  the  future  metropolis  of  New  England.  The  oaks,  and 
pines,  and  elms  cut  off  even  from  these  hills  the  view  of  other  cottages  going 
up  at  Cambridge,  only  four  miles  to  the  west ;  otherwise  they  might  have 
seen  the  heavy  timbers  being  drawn,  and  scored,  and  hewn,  that  were  soon  to 
go  together  in  the  shape  of  the  first  school,  the  parent  college  of  the  Western 
Anglo-Saxon  World. 

But  with  all  the  appliances  for  comfort  they  could  command,  disease  en- 


ioo  HISTORY  OF   ROGER    WILLIAMS. 

tered  their  ranks,  and  death  followed.  Before  the  December  blasts  had  com 
pletely  disrobed  the  forests,  the  polar  winds  were  sweeping  over  two  hundi  ed 
graves.  But  while  the  earth  lay  helplessly  locked  in  winter  ice,  around  their 
log  kitchen  fires  these  strong  men  were  making  a  code  that  has  been  the 
wonder  of  succeeding  times. 

Civil  Government  Organized,  May,  1631. — A  General  Assembly  of  the 
people  was  held.  All  the  officers  of  government,  by  universal  suffrage  of  the 
freemen  of  the  colony,  were  elected.  For  this  pure  Democracy,  a  Republi- 
can government  was  substituted,  three  years  afterwards,  and  the  second  free 
State  had  birth  in  America.  The  noble  Governor  Winthrop  was  the  chief 
pillar  of  the  new  Commonwealth,  and  he  was  clothed  with  a  dignity  greater 
than  any  office  could  bestow,  because  of  the  greatness  of  his  character.  The 
sachems  of  all  the  surrounding  tribes  were  guests  at  his  table.  But  he  was 
not  too  great  to  go  on  foot  to  Plymouth,  to  pay  an  official  visit  to  Bradford, 
the  Governor  of  the  Pilgrims.  Friendly  greetings  came  from  New  Nether- 
lands ;  and  the  colony  at  Jamestown  sent  them  a  cargo  of  corn — the  first  bread 
ship  that  ever  entered  the  harbor  of  Boston. 

What  fairer  spectacle  than  this  can  the  historian  of  any  period  show  ? 
The  great  point  was  reached  :  civilization,  with  every  element  of  security, 
strength,  and  progress,  was  established.  The  fruits  of  all  the  struggles  of  the 
human  race,  through  all  the  ages — from  the  Pyramids  of  Egypt,  from  the 
Acropolis  of  Athens,  from  the  Rome  of  the  Caesars  and  the  Pontiffs,  and  from 
the  shrines  of  learning  and  religion  in  the  British  Isles — were  all  clustered 
here.     It  was  a  new  starting-point  for  a  higher  civilization  in  the  future. 

Origin  of  Rhode  Island.  Roger  Williams. — The  name  of  this  extraordi- 
nary man  shines  out  with  peculiar  lustre  even  at  a  period  illuminated  by  a 
galaxy  of  greater  lights  than  have  ever  blazed  over  the  origin  of  any  other 
people.  Born  in  Wales,  and  educated  at  Oxford  under  the  patronage  of  the 
mighty  jurist,  Edward  Coke;  driven  in  1631,  while  yet  less  than  thirty-two 
years  of  age,  from  England,  by  persecution,  he  became  assistant  minister  of 
the  church  at  Salem.  But  he  was  too  broad  in  his  views  of  toleration  to  suit 
the  restricted  polity  or  sectarian  spirit  of  the  Puritans ;  and  soon  left  for  Ply- 
mouth, where  he  was  also  coldly  received.  But  so  highly  was  he  esteemed,  he 
was  invited  to  return  to  Salem,  where  he  proclaimed  his  advanced  views,  with 
a  freedom  which  could  not  be  tolerated ;  and  a  year  later  the  general  court  of 
Massachusetts  passed  sentence  of  suspension  and  banishment  against  him. 
He  was  found  guilty  of  denying  the  right  of  civil  authority  to  control  the  con- 
science of  the  people  ;  of  declaring  it  to  be  wrong  to  withhold  its  protec- 
tion from  any  religious  sect  whatever  \  that  the  King  had  no  right  to  demand 
an  oath  of  allegiance  from  the  colonies  ;  and  that  the  charters  lie  had  granted 
were  invalid,  since  he  could  not  give  away  lands  which  belonged  to  the  Indians. 

Roger  Williams  was  irreconcilably  opposed  to  the  entire  polity  of  the  Pu« 


HIS  BROAD    VIEWS   ON  POLITICAL  RIGHTS.  101 

utan  church.  Its  chief  leaders  at  home,  and  even  in  New  England,  still  de- 
sired to  avoid  an  open  rupture  with  the  Church  of  England.  They  attempted 
what  has,  and  will  forever  prove  a  failure,  — working  a  radical  religious  reform 
inside  of  such  an  organization.  He  did  not  believe  that  the  church  of  Christ 
was  intended  to  be  a  theocracy,  but  a  simple  body  of  believers  ;  that  it  could 
have  no  alliance  with  the  State  without  becoming  hopelessly  corrupt,  and  be- 
ing made  an  instrument  of  power  in  the  hands  of  bad  men  ;  that  the  strifes 
of  civil  society  should  never  find  a  place  in  '  the  garden  of  the  Lord  '  ;  above 
all,  said  he,  '  the  doctrine  of  persecution  for  cause  of  conscience  is  most  in- 
evitably and  lamentably  contrary  to  the  doctrine  of  Christ  Jesus.'  The  magis- 
trates insisted  on  enforcing  a  law  requiring  all  persons  to  attend  public  worship, 
He  declared  such  a  law  to  be  one  of  the  worst  statutes  in  the  English  code 
No  one  should  be  bound  to  worship,  or  maintain  worship,  against  his  own 
consent.  He  opposed  the  exclusive  selection  of  magistrates  from  members 
of  the  church.  '  As  well,'  said  he,  '  might  you  select  a  doctor  of  physic,  or  a 
pilot,  for  his  skill  in  polemics,  or  his  standing  in  the  church.'  The  grandest 
cause  of  difference,  however,  between  them,  was  the  right  of  the  magistrates, 
under  the  plea  of  guarding  the  people  against  corruption  in  morals,  to  punish 
them  for  heresy.  Exclaimed  Williams,  '  You  are  only  the  trustees  of  the  peo- 
ple ;  no  spiritual  power  has  been  conferred  on  you  :  each  individual  con- 
science is  sacred  in  itself.  The  civil  magistrates  may  not  intermeddle,  even 
to  stop  a  church  from  apostasy  and  heresy :  their  power  extends  only  to  the 
bodies  and  goods  and  outward  estate  of  men.'  At  a  later  period  he  dwelt 
with  the  joy  of  prophetic  exultation  over  the  triumph  of  his  principles,  where 
he  says,  '  the  removal  of  the  yoke  of  soul-oppression,  as  it  will  prove  an  act 
of  mercy  and  righteousness  to  the  enslaved  nations,  so  is  it  a  binding  force  to 
engage  the  whole,  and  every  interest  and  conscience  to  preserve  the  common 
liberty  and  peace.' 

The  magistrates  at  first  did  not  risk  his  forcible  removal  from  the  church 
that  loved  him  ;  but  they  withheld  from  them  the  possession  of  a  piece  of  land 
to  which  they  had  a  legal  title,  as  a  punishment  for  adhering  to  their  pastor. 
This,  however,  did  not  break  the  tie  that  bound  them.  They  protested  against 
the  injustice,  and  their  representatives  in  the  government  were  instructed  to 
secure  justice  to  the  citizens  of  Salem.  But  they  were  not  strong  enough  to 
win  the  battle.  They  were  on  the  eve  of  being  divested  of  their  civil  rights 
as  well.  The  hated  principle  of  the  alliance  of  church  and  state,  which 
had  poisoned  religion,  debauched  Christianity,  and  outraged  civilization,  was 
already  established  in  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  and  to  dispute  it  cost 
a  man  his  citizenship.  Nor  was  it  rooted  out  from  the  new  garden  of  human 
hope  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  until  many  a  man  had  been  robbed  of  his 
property ;  till  many  others  had  dragged  out  long  imprisonments ;  till  men, 
and  even  women,  had  either  been  chased  out  of  the  colonies,  or  burned  to 
cinders  at  the  stake.  The  fires  of  Smithfield — the  auto-da-fe  of  Spain  were 
attempted  to  be  established  in  New  England,  and  they  were — long  enough  to 


102  SUBLIMITY  OF    WILLIAMS'S   CHARACTER. 

show  that  they  were  exotics,  that  could  never  flourish  in  the  pure  air  of  the 
New  World. 

The  Decree  of  Banishment^  1635. — Solitary  and  alone  he  stood,  deserted 
by  those  who  loved  him  best,  through  terror  of  a  magistracy  which  embraced 
within  itself  the  power  not  only  of  property,  but  of  life  and  death.  *  I  con- 
fess,' he  said,  '  it  was  mine  own  voluntary  act ;  yea,  I  hope  the  act  of  the 
Lord  Jesus,  sounding  forth  in  me  the  blast  which  shall  in  His  own  holy  season 
cast  down  the  strength  and  confidence  of  those  inventions  of  men.'  And  in 
the  presence  of  the  magistrates,  on  his  trial,  it  is  reported  that  he  '  maintained 
the  rocky  strength  of  his  grounds,  declaring  himself  ready  to  be  bound  and  ban- 
ished, and  even  to  die  in  New  England,  rather  than  reject  the  light  which 
had  come  from  God  into  his  own  soul.'  Bancroft  here  finely  remarks,  'At  a 
time  when  Germany  was  the  battle-field  for  all  Europe  in  the  implacable  wars 
of  religion ;  when  even  Holland  was  bleeding  with  the  anger  of  vengeful  fac- 
tions ;  when  France  was  still  to  go  through  the  fearful  struggle  with  bigotry  ; 
when  England  was  gasping  under  the  despotism  of  intolerance  ;  almost  half 
a  century  before  William  Penn  became  an  American  proprietary,  and  two 
years  before  Descartes  founded  modern  philosophy  on  the  method  of  free 
reflection,  Roger  Williams  asserted  the  great  doctrine  of  intellectual  liberty. 
It  became  his  glory  to  found  a  state  upon  that  principle,  and  to  stamp  him- 
self upon  its  rising  institutions  in  characters  so  deep  that  the  impress  has  re- 
mained to  the  present  day,  and  can  never  be  erased,  without  a  total  destruc- 
tion of  the  work.  .*  .  .  We  may  compare  him  to  the  lark,  the  pleasant 
bird  of  the  peaceful  summer,  that,  affecting  to  soar  aloft,  springs  upward  from 
the  ground,  takes  his  rise  from  pale  to  tree,  and  at  last  surmounting  the  high- 
est hills,  utters  his  clear  carols  through  the  skies  of  morning.  He  was  the 
first  person  in  modern  Christendom  to  assert  in  its  plenitude  the  doctrine  of 
the  liberty  of  conscience,  the  equality  of  opinions  before  the  law  ;  and  in  its 
defense  he  was  the  harbinger  of  Milton,  the  precursor  and  superior  of  Jere- 
my Taylor — for  Jeremy  Taylor  limited  his  toleration  to  a  few  Christian  sects  ;  — 
the  philanthropy  of  Williams  compassed  the  earth. 

Well  may  our  national  historian  pass  this  eulogium  upon  the  Christian 
statesman  : — '  If  Copernicus  is  held  in  perpetual  reverence  because  on  his 
death-bed  he  published  to  the  world  that  the  sun  is  the  centre  of  our  system ; 
if  the  name  of  Kepler  is  preserved  in  the  annals  of  human  excellence  for  his 
sagacity  in  detecting  the  laws  of  the  planetary  motion  ;  if  the  genius  of  New- 
ton has  been  almost  adored  for  dissecting  a  ray  of  light,  and  weighing  heavenly 
bodies  as  in  a  balance  ; — let  there  be  for  the  name  of  Roger  Williams  at  least 
some  humble  place  among  those  who  have  advanced  moral  science,  and  made 
themselves  the  benefactors  of  mankind.' 

That  place  has  been  assigned,  and  is  by  no  means  a  humble  one.  When 
all  the  States  were  invited  to  send  statues  or  memorials  of  their  greatest  men  to 
adorn  the  national  Capitol,  Rhode  Island,  among  a  whole  constellation  of  illus- 
trious citizens,  had  no  hesitation  in  choosing  Nathaniel  Greene  to  represent  the 


HIS  STATUE  IN  THE  NATIONAL    CAPITOL. 


103 


chivalry  of  her  soldiers,  and  Roger  Williams  the  spirit  of  her  Christian  states- 
men.1 

January,  1636. — He  had  the  free,  boundless  wilderness  before  him  where  to 
choose  his  home.  Fearing,  however,  lest  he  might  settle  too  near  them,  they 
determined  to  detain  him  ;  and  he  would  probably  have  been  kept  as  a 
prisoner,  had  he  not  escaped  in  the  dead  of  winter.  For  fourteen  weeks  he 
wandered  through  the  forests,  over  deep  snows,  escaping  death  from  cold  or 
starvation,  only  by  the  shelter  extended  to  him  by  the  savages.  At  last  he 
reached  the  cabin  of  Massasoit,  the  chief  of  the  Wampanoags,  at  Mount  Hope. 
Here  he  was  hospitably  entertained  till  spring,  when  he  was  joined  by  five  of  his 
friends  from  Boston,  when  he  chose  a  settlement  on  the  Seekonk  river.  His 
movements  were  carefully  watched,  and  he  soon  received  notice  that  he  was 
within  the  territory  of  Plymouth  colony.  The  gentle  Winslow  kindly  ad- 
vised him  to  cross  over  into  the  Narraganset  country,  where  he  would  be 
secure  from  molestation.2  The  little  party  committed  themselves  to  a  canoe,  and 


1  In  all  our  history  no  name  shines  with  a  purer  light 
than  his  whose  memorial  we  have  lately  placed  in  the 
Capitol.  In  the  history  of  all  the  world  there  is  no 
more  striking  example  of  a  man  grasping  a  grand  idea, 
at  once,  in  its  full  proportions,  in  all  its  completeness, 
and  carrying  it  out,  unflinchingly,  to  its  remotest  legiti- 
mate results. 

Roger  Williams  did  not  merely  lay  the  foundation  of 
religious  freedom,  he  constructed  the  whole  edifice,  in 
all  its  impregnable  strength,  in  all  its  imperishable 
beauty.  Those  who  have  followed  him,  in  the  same 
spirit,  have  not  been  able  to  add  anything  to  the  grand 
and  simple  words  in  which  he  enunciated  the  principle, 
nor  to  surpass  him  in  the  exact  fidelity  with  which  he 
reduced  it  to  the  practical  business  of  government. 

Religious  freedom,  which  now,  by  general  consent, 
underlies  the  foundation  principles  of  civilized  govern- 
ment, was,  at  that  time,  looked  upon  as  a  wilder  theory 
than  any  proposition,  moral,  political,  or  religious,  that 
has  since  engaged  the  serious  attention  of  mankind. 
It  was  regarded  as  impracticable,  disorganizing,  impi- 
ous, and,  if  not  .utterly  subversive  of  social  order,  it 
was  not  so  only  because  its  manifest  absurdity  would 
prevent  any  serious  effort  to  enforce  it.  The  lightest 
punishment  deemed  due  to  its  confessor  was  to  drive 
him  out  into  the  howling  wilderness.  Had  he  not 
met  with  more  Christian  treatment  from  the  savage 
children  of  the  forest  than  he  had  found  from  '  the 
Lord's  anointed,'  he  would  have  perished  in  the  be- 
ginning of  his  experiment. 

Such  a  man  was  Roger  Williams.  No  thought  of 
himself,  no  idea  of  recompense  or  of  praise  interfered 
to  sully  the  perfect  purity  of  his  motives,  the  perfect 
disinterestedness  of  his  conduct.  Laboring  for  the 
highest  good  of  his  fellow-men,  he  was  entirely  indiffer- 
ent to  their  praises.  He  knew,  for  God,  whose  prophet 
he  was,  had  revealed  it  to  him,  that  the  great  principle 
for  which  he  contended,  and  for  which  he  suffered, 
founded  in  the  eternal  fitness  of  things,  would  endure 
forever.  He  did  not  inquire  if  his  name  would  survive 
a  generation.  In  his  vision  of  the  future,  he  saw  man- 
kind emancipated  from  the  thraldom  of  priestcraft, 
from  the  blindness  of  bigotry,  from  the  cruelties  of  in- 
tolerance ;  he  saw  the  nations  walking  forth  in  the 
liberty  wherewith  Christ  had  made  them  free ;  he  saw 
no  memorial  of  himself,  in  marble  or  in  bronze,  or  in  the 
general  admiration  of  mankind.  More  than  two  centu- 
ries have  passed  since  he  flourished  ;  nearly  two  centu- 
ries have  passed  since  he  died,  buried  like  Moses,  for 
'no  man  knoweth  of  his  sepulchre;'  and  now  the 
great  doctrine  which  he  taught  pervades  the  civilized 
world.  A  grateful  State  sends  up  here  the  ideal  image 
of  her  Founder  and  her  Father.  An  appreciative  na- 
tion receives  it,  and,  through  her  accredited  representa- 
tives, pledges  herself  to  preserve  it  among  her  most 
precious  treasures. — Speech  of  Senator  Anthony  in 
the  Senate  of  the  United  States,  Jan.  9,  1872,  on  the 


presentation  of  Simmons'  statue  of  Roger  Williams 
by  the  State  of  Rhode  Island. 

In  the  year  1859,  an  association  of  some  of  the  more 
public-spirited  citizens  of  Providence  was  formed,  for 
the  purpose  of  erecting  a  monument  to  Roger  Williams. 
After  a  careful  search,  his  grave  was  found  on  the  land 
he  once  owned,  and  satisfactorily  identified.  He  was 
buried  near  the  living  spring  which  had  attracted  him 
as  he  turned  the  bow  of  his  canoe  to  land.  The  follow- 
ing incidents  are  taken  from  Mr.  Zachariah  Allen's 
'  Paper  read  before  the  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society, 
May  18,  1820  : ' 

On  looking  down  into  the  pit  whilst  the  sextons 
were  clearing  it  of  earth,  the  root  of  an  adjacent  apple- 
tree  was  discovered.  This  tree  had  pushed  downwards 
one  of  its  main  roots  in  a  sloping  diicction  and  nearly 
straight  course  towards  the  precise  spot  that  had  been 
occupied  by  the  skull  of  Roger  Williams.  There  mak- 
ing a  turn  conforming  with  its  circumference,  the  root 
followed  the  direction  of  the  back-bone  to  the  hips,  and 
thence  divided  into  two  branches,  each  one  following  a 
leg-bone  to  the  heel,  where  they  both  turned  upwards 
to  the  extremities  of  the  toes  of  the  skeleton.  One  of 
the  roots  formed  a  slight  crook  at  the  part  occupied  by 
the  knee-joint,  thus  producing  an  increased  resemblance 
to  the  outlines  of  the  skeleton  of  Roger  Williams,  as  if, 
indeed,  moulded  thereto  by  the  powers  of  vegetable 
life.  This  singularly  formed  root  has  been  carefully 
preserved,  as  constituting  a  very  impressive  exemplifi- 
cation of  the  mode  in  which  the  contents  of  the  grave 
had  been  entirely  absorbed. 

The  roots  still  remain  in  my  possession  (January, 
1869),  and  are  preserved  as  corroborating  the  statements 
of  Mr.  Allen  in  his  historical  address. 

Stephen  Randall. 

8  It  is  amazing  how  abounding  was  his  charity* 
even  for  his  persecutors.  He  shields  them  as  much  as 
he  can,  in  his  own  account  of  these  transactions. 
'That  ever  honored  Governor  Winthrop,'  he  says,. 
'  privately  wrote  to  me  to  steer  my  course  to  the  Narra- 
ganset Bay,  encouraging  me,  from  the  freeness  of  the 
place  from  English  claims  or  patents.  I  took  his  pru- 
dent motion  as  a  voice  from  God.' 

'  I  did  ever  from  my  soul  honor  and  love  them 
[the  magistrates  who  had  banished  himj,  even  when 
their  judgment  led  them  to  afflict  me.'  He  assailed 
with  the  utmost  severity  the  wrong,  the  crime  of  intol- 
erance and  persecution, — never  the  persecutor.  He 
relates  the  following  incident :  '  Many  hearts  were 
touched  with  relentings.  That  great  and  pious  soul, 
Mr.  Winslow,  melted,  and  kindly  visited  me,  and  put 
a  piece  of  gold  inro  the  hands  of  my  wife,  for  our 
supply.'  And  Cotton  Mather  kindly  said  of  the  exile  : 
'  In  the  whole  course  and  tenor  of  his  life  and  conduct, 
he  has  been  one  of  the  most  disinterested  men  thai 
ever  lived — a  most  pious  and  heavenly-minded  soul.' 


io4  ABSOLUTE    TOLERATION  FIRST  PROCLAIMED. 

paddled  their  way  around  the  head  of  Narraganset  Bay,  where,  on  a  beautiful 
/reen  slope,  warm  with  the  sun  of  the  advancing  season,  they  gathered  arounc 
i  spring  of  pure  water,  and  consecrated  with  prayer  the  new  home  they  had 
chosen.  When  Canonicus,  the  aged  chief  of  the  Narraganset  tribe,  learned 
that  the  men  had  been  banished  by  their  own  brother  pale-faces,  and  that 
they  had  come  with  peaceable  intentions,  he  generously  ceded  them  the  spot 
they  had  chosen,  and  *  in  commemoration  of  God's  merciful  providence  to 
us  in  our  distress,  we  called  the  place  Providence' 

*  My  time,'  he  says,  '  was  not  spent  altogether  in  spiritual  labors ;  but  day 
and  night,  at  home  and  abroad,  on  land  and  water,  at  the  oar,  for  bread/  He 
was  within  the  territory  of  the  Narragansets,  and  needing  more  land  for  him- 
self and  those  who  were  joining  him,  he  purchased  a  large  tract,  and  obtained 
an  undisputed  title  from  Canonicus  and  Miantonomah, — so  that  'it  was  my  own 
as  truly  as  any  man's  coat  on  his  back.  But  I  could  not  reserve  to  myself 
one  foot  of  land,  nor  one  tittle  of  political  power,  more  than  we  grant  to  all 
servants,  and  all  strangers — my  share.'  In  fact,  he  gave  away  not  only  of  his 
lands,  but  of  all  his  other  property,  to  those  he  thought  most  in  want,  until  he 
had  given  away  all.  And  thus  he  founded  the  State,  a  pure  Democracy,  '  in 
civil  things  only,  since  God  is  the  sole  ruler  of  the  conscience.' 

Absolute  Toleration  Proclaimed  for  the  First  Time  in  North  America. — ■ 
From  that  sacred  spot  the  banner  of  absolute  freedom  was  unfolded,  and  the 
constitution  of  the  new  State  was  proclaimed.  It  embraced  the  cardinal 
principles  of  the  religion  founded  by  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  and  ratified  in  the 
next  century  by  the  Declaration  of  Independence ;  complete  liberty  of  con- 
science, in  religion  and  politics — a  pure,  Christian,  Democratic  brotherhood, 
in  which  membership  of  the  commonwealth  consisted  only  in  subscribing  to 
an  agreement  to  submit  to  such  rules  as  should  be  adopted  by  the  free  suf- 
frage of  the  inhabitants,  so  far  as  they  should  not  affect  the  individual  con- 
science. The  founder  reserved  no  privileges  or  power  for  himself.  Perfect 
equality  in  citizenship  was  the  fundamental  law.1  As  might  be  supposed, 
this  constitution  formed  a  basis  for  growth  and  permanent  prosperity.  It  was 
the  realization  of  the  ideal  of  a  Christian  Democratic  State  carried  out.  Ca- 
nonicus was  one  of  those  great  men  on  whom  the  hand  of  Nature  puts  her  seal, 
regardless  of  clime,  race,  or  age  ;  and  he  completely  understood  the  spirit  of 
the  stranger  whom  he  had  made  his  guest.  He  adopted  him  as  a  son,  and 
treated  him  with  deference  and  love.  He  remained  his  friend  to  the  last ;  he 
extended  over  him  his  protection  ;  and  during  the  terrible  Pequot  war  which 
we  have  briefly  described,  Roger  Williams's  settlement  remained  unmolested. 

Accessions  from  the  Surrounding  Colonies. — News  of  what  was  going  on 
at  Providence  soon  flew  through  the  colonies,  and  from  all  quarters  those 
who  considered  themselves  the  victims  of  persecution,  fled  to  it  as  to  a  city  of 
refuge.     None  were  excluded.     Persecution  for  opinion's  sake  was  waxing 

1  The  word  Narraganset  means  Peaceful  Isle,  sometimes  called  Aquitneck  or  Aquitnet. 


D    THK    IN  MAN*. 


THE  FATE    OF  ANNE  HUTCHINSON.  105 

strong  in  Massachusetts,  and  Anne  Hutchinson,  a  pure-minded  and  lofty- 
spirited  woman,  had  been  thrown  into  Boston  jail  for  the  crime  of  free  thought 
and  free  speech.  The  authorities  were  too  strong  to  be  resisted,  and  sub- 
mission or  flight  were  the  only  alternatives.  Dr.  John  Clark,  William  Cod- 
dington,  and  the  husband  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  with  sixteen  other  aggrieved 
persons,  accepted  the  invitation  of  Williams  to  settle  in  his  neighborhood. 
Miantonomah  told  them  that  he  would  give  them  the  beautiful  Aquiday-r-the 
(ndian  name  of  Rhode  Island — if  they  chose  to  give  him  forty  fathoms  of 
*'hite  wampum.  In  addition  to  this  trifle,  it  was  proposed  to  add  ten  coats 
and  twenty  hoes,  if  they  would  remove  from  the  island  before  the  next 
v/inter.  During  the  summer  they  planted  a  settlement  on  the  northern  verge 
of  the  island,  which  they  called  Portsmouth.  They  adopted  a  constitution  in 
harmony  with  Roger  Williams's  ;  and  borrowing  the  form  of  government  from 
the  Levitical  code,  they  chose  a  chief  magistrate  under  the  title  of  Judge,  with 
three  associates.  Other  settlers  from  Boston  flocked  in,  and  in  1639,  New- 
port, at  the  other  end  of  the  island,  was  founded.  And  thus  this  little  cluster 
of  free  and  independent  communities  went,  on  harmoniously  together,  each 
taking  care  of  its  own  separate  interests  j  but  they  were  all  united  by  love, 
the  firmest  of  all  bonds,  and  they  adopted  a  common  seal  with  the  significant 
motto,  Amor  vincit  omnia. 

Many  a  tear  has  fallen  over  the  fate  of  that  heroine  and  martyr,  the 
gifted  Anne  Hutchinson.  She  had  been  accustomed  in  her  English  life  to 
the  luxuries  and  sweet  charities  of  refinement,  wealth,  and  culture ;  and  a  feel- 
ing of  indignation  at  last  waxed  so  strong  against  her  persecutors  in  Boston, 
that  she  might  perhaps  have  lived  and  escaped  death  by  burning ;  but  she 
preferred  to  join  her  friends  in  Rhode  Island.  Even  there,  however,  the  sus- 
picion of  witchcraft  followed  her  to  embitter  her  home,  now  made  happy  by  a 
growing  family  of  children.  At  last  she  preferred  the  tranquillity  of  the  wil- 
derness desolation,  and  she  plunged  off  with  her  boys  and  girls  into  the  deep 
forests,  resolved  to  throw  herself  upon  the  hospitalities  of  the  Dutch  of  New 
Amsterdam.  She  reached  New  Rochelle,  and  was  safe  until  the  hostili- 
ties of  the  Indians  had  been  provoked  by  the  atrocities  of  Kieft,  the  Dutch 
magistrate.  In  one  of  those  bloody  skirmishes  her  house  was  set  on  fire,  and 
between  the  tomahawks  of  the  savages  and  the  flames,  she  perished  with  her 
family  in  the  ruins  of  her  humble  dwelling  :— only  a  little  daughter  escaped.1 

The  Charter,  March  24,  1644. — The  three  settlements  acknowledged 
no  allegiance  to  the  Massachusetts  or  Plymouth  colonies ;  but  desirous  of 
forming  a  more  perfect  political  union  among  themselves,  Roger  Williams 
event  to  England,  and,  through  the  powerful  influence  of  Sir  Henry  Vane, 
obtained  a  charter  which  united  them  all  under  the  title  of  '  Rhode  Island  and 
Providence  Plantations.'     And  thus  another  pearl  was  added  to  the  string  of 

1  Of  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  Dudley  says  :   'Her  profit-     never  speak  of  her  without  acknowledging  her  eloquence 
able  and  sober  carriage  was  such  that  her  enemies  could     and  her  ability.' 


io6    EARLY  COLONIZATION  OF  MAINE  AND  NEW  HAMPSHIRE, 

free  States  that  was  to  form  the  necklace  of  thirteen  gems  to  be  laid  on  the 
bosom  of  our  goddess  of  Liberty. 

Maine. — The  coasts  and  rivers  of  Maine  were  explored  at  an  early  pe- 
riod, and  she  claims  precedence  in  attempted  settlements,  even  over  Massa- 
chusetts.1 Sir  Fernando  Gorges  had  for  many  years  been  carrying  on  traffic 
with  the  Indians  of  New  England,  and  became  associated  with  John  Mason, 
a  merchant  and  seaman  of  great  energy  and  enterprise.  He  had  been  the 
Secretary  of  the  Plymouth  Council  for  New  England ;  and  with  Gorges 
obtained  a  grant,  in  1622,  of  the  territory  stretching  from  the  Merrimac  to 
the  Kennebunk  rivers,  and  to  the  north-west  as  far  as  the  St.  Lawrence. 
The  year  before,  David  Thompson  had  settled  a  colony  of  fishermen  at  the 
little  harbor  on  the  Piscataqua  river,  just  below  Portsmouth ;  and  two  years 
later,  another  fishing  station  was  established  at  Dover. 

New  Hampshire — Rev.  Mr.  Wheelwright,  1629. — Banished  from  the 
Massachusetts  colony  during  the  persecution  of  his  sister-in-law,  Anne 
Hutchinson,  he  purchased  from  the  Indians  the  title  to  the  forest  lying  be- 
tween the  Merrimac  and  the  Piscataqua,  and  in  1629  he  founded  Exeter. 
Gorges  had  at  the  same  time  made  Mason  exclusive  owner,  in  his  right,  to 
the  same  tract.  In  163T  he  built  a  house  on  the  site  of  the  present  city  of 
Portsmouth,  and  called  the  whole  domain  New  Hampshire.  Other  settle- 
ments were  established,  and  trading-houses  were  built  as  far  east  as  Machias ; 
but  they  were  driven  off  by  the  French,  who  claimed  authority  for  the  west- 
ern limits  of  Acadia  as  far  as  Pemaquid  Point.  But  these  settlements  were 
too  feeble  and  scattered  to  stand  securely  alone,  and  they  formed  a  coalition 
with  the  Massachusetts  colony  in  1641,*  and  remained  dependencies  of  that 
province  for  forty  years.  In  1680  this  coalition  was  dissolved  by  act  of  the 
King  of  England,  when  New  Hampshire  became  a  royal  province,  ruled  by 
a  governor  and  council  appointed  by  the  King,  and  House  of  Representatives 
elected  by  the  people.  Such  was  the  origin  of  the  Commonwealth  of  New 
Hampshire. 

1  Mr.  R.  K.  Sewall,  of  Wiscasset,  Me.,  has  investi-  a  county,  and  called  Yorkshire.     In  1621  King  James, 

gated  the  subject  of  the  early  history  of  that  region,  as  sovereign  of  Scotland,  placed  the  Scottish  seal  to  a 

with  more   patience  and  learning  probably  than  any  charter,  granting  to  Sir  William  Alexander,  afterward  - 

other  man.     In  a  very  interesting  letter,  which  he  was  [1633]  Earl  of  Stirling,  the  whole  territory  eastward  of 

kind  enough  to  write  me  on  the  20th  of  May,  this  year  the  State  of  Maine,  under  the  title  of  Nova  Scotia,  or 

— 1874 — he  says  :  New  Scotland.     The  French   had   already  occupied 

'  My  investigations  cover  transactions  in  New  Eng-  places  along  the  coast,  and  called  the  country  Acadia. 
land  history  from  1565  to  1620 — a  period  now  blank.  The  Scotch  proprietor  never  attempted  settlements, 
I  show  conclusively  that  New  England  had  its  begin-  either  in  this  territory  or  in  Canada,  which  Charles  tho 
nings  in  Maine  ;  and  also  the  probable  visit  of  Phoeni-  First  had  granted  to  him,  and  the  whole  country  had 
cian  adventurers  here  ;  and  Spanish  military  posts  or  passed  into  the  hands  of  the  French,  by  treaty.  1'he 
strongholds.  I  must  refer  you  to  my  Ancient  Do-  Earl  died  in  1640,  and  all  connection  of  his  family  with 
minions  of  Maine,  published  in  1859  ;  and  my  late  Nova  Scotia  ceased.  His  title  was  held  afterward  by 
lecture  before  the  Massachusetts  Genealogical  Society  ;  four  successors,  the  last  of  whom  died  in  1739.  In 
and  the  February  transactions  of  our  Maine  Historical  1759,  William  Alexander  (General  Lord  Stirling  during 
Society,  for  my  papers  on  the  facts  and  theories  I  have  our  war  for  independence)  made  an  unsuccessful  claim 
in  hand.  I  also  have  nearly  ready  a  work  on  The  to  the  title.  The  next  claimant  was  Alexander  Hum- 
Beginnings  of  New  England,  concerning  the  points  in  phrey,  who  commenced  operations  in  the  Scottish 
question."  courts  in   1815,  and,  by  forgeries  and  frauds,  was  par- 

aThe  people  of  these  eastern  settlements,  which  tially   successful.     The  whole  was  exposed  in   1833, 

formed  the  basis  of  the  present  commonwealth  of  Maine,  Humphrey  was  in   this  country  in   1852,   pressing  his 

did  not  like  the  government  attempted  to  be  established  claims  to  the  monopoly  of  the  eastern  fisheries,  by  vir- 

by  the  proprietor,  and  taking  political  power  into  their  tue  of  the  grants  of  Kings  James  and   Charles  more 

own  hands,  placed  themselves  under  the  jurisdiction  of  than  two  hundred  years  ago  ! — Lossing's  History  of 

Massachusetts  in  1652.    The  territory  was  erected  into  the  United  States,  p.  80. 


FIRST  UNION  OF   THE  NEW  ENGLAND   COLONIES.       107 

The  United  Colonies  of  New  England,  1643. — Although  the  emigrants 
to  New  England  now  numbered  upwards  of  twenty  thousand,  and  they  had 
established  fifty  villages,  and  built  as  many  places  of  worship,  yet  they  were 
surrounded  by  perils  which  not  only  retarded  their  growth,  but  threatened  their 
overthrow.  They  had  received  no  favor  from  the  home  government ;  not  a 
ship  had  been  offered  for  their  embarkation  ;  not  a  dollar  of  the  money  of  the 
Crown  had  been  given  for  their  outfits  or  maintenance  in  their  settlements. 
At  most,  the  king  was  willing  to  get  rid  of  them,  regarding  them  only  as  dis- 
turbers of  the  public  peace,  and  entertaining  principles  of  liberty  which  men- 
aced the  security  of  royalty  itself.  But  as  the  rank  of  the  emigrants  gradually 
rose,  and  men  of  wealth  and  consideration  were  beginning  to  leave,  the  gov- 
ernment took  alarm,  'lest  too  many  of  the  best  people  should  go  away.' 
Severe  measures  were  resorted  to.  In  John  Milton's  plea  for  the  Puritans, 
he  speaks  of  '  the  departure  of  so  many  of  the  best  of  faithful  and  freeborn 
Englishmen,  and  good  Christians.'  The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  was  clothed 
with  authority  to  control  the  American  colonies  ;  to  regulate  their  religion ; 
*  inflicting  heavy  penalties  against  all  refractory  persons,  revoking  charters,  and 
suppressing  every  measure  which  indicated  insubordination  to  the  Throne.' 
A  fleet  of  eight  vessels  in  the  Thames,  all  ready  for  sailing — on  which  Hamp- 
den and  Cromwell  themselves  were  said  to  have  embarked,  with  many  others 
of  the  strong  men  of  England — was  detained.  Things  went  so  far  that  a  writ 
of  quo  warranto  from  the  King's  Bench  was  issued  against  the  Massachusetts 
Bay  colony.  It  seemed  to  be  the  determination  of  the  Royalist  party  to  crush 
out  all  germs  of  independence  in  the  new  settlements.  But  this  only  inflamed 
a  spirit  of  indignation,  and  means  were  at  once  devised  for  self-protection. 
Poor  as  the  colonists  were,  at  a  general  meeting  in  Boston,  attended  by  all 
the  ministers,  as  well  as  leading  citizens,  bold  declarations  were  made,  and 
efficient  measures  adopted.  Six  hundred  pounds  were  raised  for  constructing 
fortifications,  and  a  sort  of  Declaration  of  Independence  was  made.  Rumors 
had  reached  them  that  a  Royal  Governor — a  Viceroy  clothed  with  arbitrary 
power — was  on  his  way.     They  were  firmly  resolved  to  resist  him. 

Growing  Hostility  of  the  Indian  Tribes. — Immediately  after  the  close  of 
the  Pequot  war,  in  1637,  a  plan  for  the  union  of  the  Colonies  began  to  be 
discussed.  Massasoit  was  indeed  loyal  in  his  friendship,  and  continued  so  to 
the  last ;  and  Miantonomah  could  be  depended  on.  But  Canonicus  was  dead, 
and  his  son  and  successor,  Philip, — a  man  of  rare  qualities,  fired  by  a  patri- 
otic zeal  for  his  race  and  country, — was  so  ceaselessly  urged  on  by  the  fiery 
spirits  of  his  tribe,  that  it  was  evident  he  could  no  longer  restrain  them. 
There  was,  besides,  a  general  feeling  of  hostile  jealousy  growing  up  among 
the  Indians  of  New  England,  that  would  soon  bring  about  a  life  and  death 
collision  between  them  and  those  whom  they  regarded  as  invaders.  They  saw 
them  increasing  in  numbers ;  all  the  time  new  ships  were  arriving ;  the  settle- 
ments were  spreading  in  all  directions ;  comfortable  dwellings  and  churches 
were  going  up  ;  the  strong  hand  of  labor  was  levelling  the  forest,  and  bringing 


108       NATURE   OF   THE  NEW  ENGLAND   CONFEDERACY. 

large  tracts  under  cultivation  ;  hostilities  between  the  native  tribes  had  weak- 
ened their  numbers :  and  in  the  terrible  fate  of  the  Pequots  they  easily  read 
their  own,  unless  they  should  all  unite  in  a  common  alliance.  This  union 
could  not  be  one  merely  of  self-defense.  The  more  sagacious  of  the  chiefs 
saw  that  the  struggle  must  end  in  the  supremacy  of  one  party  or  the  other. 
At  last  Philip  himself,  very  much  against  his  own  will  and  judgment,  as  he 
afterwards  confessed,  was  forced  into  the  plan  for  a  general  extermination  of 
the  colonists.  By  no  other  means  could  he  or  his  allies  discern  any  escape 
from  destruction. 

There  were  also  early  evidences  of  a  design  on  the  part  of  the  French 
settlers  of  Acadia  and  the  St.  Lawrence,  to  win  over  the  native  tribes ;  and 
how  steadily  and  adroitly  this  policy  was  pursued,  became  evident  enough 
afterwards,  when  the  fruits  of  this  careful  sowing  were  reaped  in  those 
Indian  alliances  which  led  to  the  frightful  massacres  which  marked  the 
bloody  history  of  the  French  war  against  the  English  in  North  America. 
Moreover,  the  colonists  were  already  suffering  from  the  growing  encroach- 
ments and  depredations  of  the  Dutch  on  their  western  borders,  and  a  survey 
of  the  perils  of  their  position  led  to  a  union  of  the  colonies  of  New 
England,  which  embraced  the  separate  governments  of  Massachusetts, 
Plymouth,  Connecticut,  and  New  Haven.  This  was  the  first  organization 
of  political  power  on  this  continent.  Plymouth  being  the  oldest  colony, 
claimed  precedence,  to  which  Rhode  Island  would  not  yield;  for  they  believed 
that  the  friendly  relations  which  Roger  Williams  and  his  associates  had  estab- 
lished and  maintained  with  the  Indian  tribes  would  insure  them  against  hos- 
tilities : — and  events  justified  them  in  their  confidence. 

The  rights  of  each  member  of  this  confederacy  were  so  jealously  guarded 
that  we  find  in  the  reservation  of  their  powers,  something  corresponding 
very  closely  with  the  doctrine  of  State  Rights,  which  afterwards  became  so 
popular,  and  withal  so  fatal  a  notion  in  the  Southern  States  of  our  own 
Republic.  Those  public  interests  which  appertained  strictly  to  the  con- 
federacy, were  intrusted  to  commissioners,  two  of  whom  were  appointed  by 
each  colony.  Their  powers  were  restricted  to  'the  proper  concomitants, 
or  consequence  of  a  confederation.'  They  were  to  determine  all  questions 
of  war  or  peace  with  the  Indian  tribes.  The  money  for  public  purposes  was 
to  be  raised  by  a  per  capita  assessment;  and  no  precedence  was  given  in  this 
directory,  since  all  the  colonies  were  equal  in  their  representation.  This 
union  assumed  the  chief  attributes  of  sovereignty;  and  in  1652  established  a 
mint,  and  coined  silver  money — the  first  within  the  territory  of  the  United 
States.  The  confederacy  lasted,  moreover,  for  forty  years — a  period  during 
which  the  Government  of  England  was  changed  three  times  by  revolution.1 

Growi?ig  Strength  of  the  Colonies. — However  unfriendly  had  been  the 

1  Now  that  the  causes  of  apprehension  were  sus-  As  the  author  of  the  fundamental  code,  he  is  the  most 
pended,  the  great  work  of  constitutional  legislation  was  remarkable  of  all  the  early  legislators  of  Massachusetts ; 
resumed ;  and  in  December,  1641,  a  session  of  three  he  had  been  formerly  a  student,  and  practised  in  the 
wc-Vs  was  employed  in  considering  a  system  which  courts  of  common  law  in  England,  and  became  a  non- 
had   aeen  prepared  by  Nathaniel  Ward,  of  Ipswich,  conforming  minister ;   so   that  he  was  competent  to 


CROMWELL'S  COMMONWEALTH  .ESTABLISHED.  109 

spirit  which  Kings  James  and  Charles  had  displayed  towards  the  New 
England  colonies,  they  were  powerless  to  materially  interfere  with  their 
prosperity ;  and  a  great  event  was  about  to  occur  in  England  which  was  to 
leave  a  period  of  freedom  for  their  undisturbed  progress.  The  reigning  house 
of  Stuart  was  rushing  blindly  to  its  ruin.  My  readers  all  know  how  the 
brave  English  nation  rose  against  the  despotism  of  Charles  I.,  and  shook 
from  herself  the  mountain-load  of  tyranny,  in  the  throes  of  a  great  revolution. 

The  Commonwealth  of  England  Established,  1640. — The  hour  had  come 
when  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  was  to  achieve  its  independence  forever.  That 
same  spirit  which  was  afterwards  to  work  our  own  emancipation  from  the 
despotism  of  England,  was  now  to  achieve  liberty  for  England  herself.  The 
same  volcanic  fires  were  burning  beneath  both  nations.  The  rupture  came 
later  here,  because  the  occasion  for  the  explosion  was  delayed.  In  England 
the  exigencies  of  the  times  demanded  immediate  action.  Since  the  days  of 
the  Magna  Charta,  it  had  been  an  established  principle  with  the  British 
Government,  that  Parliament  was  supreme ;  and  that  however  broad  may 
have  been  the  concessions  to  the  royal  prerogative,  it  could  never  entrench 
upon  the  parliamentary  supremacy  of  the  British  people.  All  power  inhered  in 
the  people — all  laws  must  issue  from  their  representatives.  The  arbitrary 
will  of  the  British  sovereign  was  to  be  heard  of  no  more.  It  was  a  question 
never  afterwards  to  be  entertained  for  debate  a  single  hour.  This  great 
principle,  however,  was  to  be  incorporated  more  clearly  into  the  British  Con- 
stitution than  it  had  ever  been  ;  it  was  to  be  placed  within  the  sacred  category 
of  precedents,  behind  which  England  seldom  has  gone  ;  never  when  those 
precedents  were  in  favor  of  popular  liberty. 

During  this  struggle  despotism  was  too  weak  to  interfere  with  the  colonists. 
While  the  Throne  was  tottering  at  home,  it  was  a  poor  time  to  oppress 
colonists  three  thousand  miles  away.  While  Tyranny  was  reeling  to  its 
fall  there,  Liberty  was  coming  out  from  its  cradle  here,  to  begin  her  more  than 
Herculean  labors. 

Cromwell  the  Friend  of  America. — It  matters  little  to  us  what  England 
may  think  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  the  greatest  man  she  has  had  since  Alfred,  under 
whom  she  achieved  all  the  liberty  she  has  to  this  hour.  The  period  in  which  he 
controlled  the  affairs  of  the  British  Empire,  Americans  will  always  remember  as 
a  time  when  they  were  exempt  from  despotism  and  rapacity.  He  removed 
restrictions  upon  commerce ;  he  interposed  no  obstacles  to  emigration ;  he 
comprehended  fully  the  spirit  that  moved  the  colonists  of  America ;  he  en- 
tered warmly  into  their  enterprise  of  establishing  Christian  civilization  on  these 
shores ;  they  desired  from  him  nothing  more.  All  the  American  colonies 
ever  asked  for  from  England  was  not  to  be  interfered  with  in  the  prosecution  of 
their  just,  legal,  and  honorable  enterprises,  as  equal  subjects  of  the  home 

Combine  the  humane  doctrines  of  the  common  law  with  vie  with  any  similar  record  from  the  days  of  Magna 

the  principles  of  right  and  equality,  as  deduced  from  Charta,  was  adopted  as  the  body  of  liberties   of 

the   Bible.      After   mature  deliberation,  his  'model,'  the  Massachusetts  colony — Bancroft,  vol.  i    p.  416- 

which   for  its   liberality   and  comprehensiveness   may  417. 


no  THE   CHARACTER   OF   THE  PURITANS. 

empire.  It  was  only  when  they  were  driven  to  it  in  the  last  extremity,  thai 
the  Declaration  of  Independence  was  extorted  from  them ;  for  extorted  it  was 
— it  did  not  come  so  willingly ;  it  was  the  work  of  British  oppression,  and  not 
the  out-growth  of  American  aspiration  or  desire.  The  records  of  those  times 
are  filled  with  expressions  of  sympathy  entertained  by  Cromwell  for  the 
American  settlers,  and  by  them  for  him,  as  the  champion  .of  the  great  princi- 
ples of  freedom.  In  the  praying  circles  of  America  ;  by  every  hearthstone, 
at  least  in  New  England,  '  the  spirits  of  the  brethren  were  carried  forth  in 
faithful  and  affectionate  prayers  in  his  behalf.'  'They  are  engaged,'  said 
the  great  Protector,  ■  in  the  same  work  of  the  Lord  as  we  are ;  they  are 
fighting  God's  battle,  as  well  as  we.' 

The  Character  of  the  Puritans. — There  has  been  more  careless  writing 
about  the  Puritans;  more  reckless  judgments  have  been  passed  upon  them ; 
they  have  been  less  understood,  and  worse  misrepresented  than  any  other 
class  of  men.  How  were  they  judged  by  the  standard  of  their  times  ?  John 
Milton,  Richard  Baxter,  Edward  Coke,  the  Earl  of  Southampton,  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  Lord  Bacon, — the  strongest  and  best  names  that  embellished  that 
age, — paid  to  them  such  honors  as  have  never  been  offered  by  contemporaries 
to  any  other  set  of  men.  Their  characters  were  elaborated  in  the  throes  of  a 
mighty  revolution  of  thought.  They  were  purified  by  passing  through  the 
seven  times  heated  furnace  of  persecution.  They  were  stripped  of  every  earthly 
treasure,  and  looking  only  to  the  rewards  of  everlasting  life,  they  went  tc 
work  to  lay  up  treasures  in  heaven.  Pained  and  sickened  at  the  religious 
bigotry  and  superstition  of  their  times ;  indignant  at  the  heavy  yoke  of  priestly 
tyranny  that  bent  down  the  necks  of  men ;  outraged  by  the  insults  and  in- 
dignities heaped  upon  the  human  soul  by  the  usurpers  of  conscience ;  fired 
by  love  of  freedom  ;  deep  beyond  modern  soundings  in  their  convictions  that 
the  Bible  was  the  sole  revelation  of  the  mind  of  God  to  his  creatures ;  recog- 
nizing the  intervention  of  no  priest,  except  the  Great  High  Priest  who  had 
made  an  eternal  sacrifice,  and  passed  within  the  vail  forever  to  intercede 
for  his  people  ;  feeling  the  worthlessness  of  all  earthly  possessions,  and  the 
vanity  of  all  worldly  honors,  they  acknowledged  no  citizenship  except  in 
heaven.  Believing  that  the  earth  with  all  its  works  was  to  be  burned  up, 
they  sought  '  a  city  that  hath  foundations,  whose  builder  and  maker  is  God.' 
There  were  but  two  items  in  their  creed — God  in  heaven,  the  sole  Master, 
the  King  of  kings,  and  Lord  of  lords  ;  and  the  absolute  liberty  of  his  children 
on  earth.  All  oppression  of  man  by  his  fellow-man  was  an  insult  to  God.  Thei? 
politics  were  all  summed  up  in  a  pure  Democracy  for  civil  government,  with 
one  Supreme  Ruler,  even  God. 

Such  men  made  bad  subjects  for  despotism.  They  could  not  live  in  the 
Old  World  in  peace  ;  and  valuing  liberty  dearer  than  all  else,  they  chose  the 
hardships  of  a  wilderness  life,  rather  than  sacrifice  the  chief  object  of  exist- 
ence. Having  no  abiding-place,  but  seeking  one  to  come,  they  '  confessed 
that  they  were  Pilgrims  and  strangers  on  the  earth.' 


THEIR  SOCIAL  AND  POLITICAL  SYSTEM.  1*1 

Having  once  fixed  their  home  in  the  wilderness,  secured  by  fair  pur 
chase  their  title  to  the  soil  from  its  only  owners,  and  planted  their  communi 
ties,  they  had  a  legal  and  a  moral  right  to  regulate  their  institutions,  and  es- 
tablish such  a  civil  and  religious  system  as  to  them  seemed  best.  By  no  law 
of  God  or  man  could  any  other  being  come  in  to  disturb  them.  If  they  had 
a  right  to  establish  their  system,  they  had  a  right  to  defend  it  against  all 
comers.1  The  world  knew  all  this  :  every  emigrant  that  embarked  to  join 
them  knew  beforehand  exactly  the  conditions  on  which  he  had  voluntarily 
become  a  member  of  those  communities,  or  could  enjoy  their  protection.  If 
he  didn't  like  them,  he  could  stay  away  :  but  he  could  not  be  allowed  to  go 
there  and  make  trouble.  If  he  did,  he  knew  the  penalty.  Not  a  man  or 
woman  was  banished  from  their  communities  but  what  acknowledged  the 
justice  of  their  exclusion,  provided  they  could  not  subscribe  to  the  rules  and 
regulations  that  had  been  established.  And  thus,  sooner  or  later,  outsiders 
learned  that  no  legal  wrong  had  been  committed  on  them  j  that  if  they  were 
not  satisfied,  they  could  choose  a  new  home,  and  follow  the  example  of 
those  who  had  preceded  them  j  there  was  ample  room  and  verge  enough  :  and 
so  the  thing  took  care  of  itself. 

The  Dutchman  was  no  Pilgrim ;  the  Frenchman  was  no  Puritan  :  even  the 
Quaker,  intense  in  his  Orthodxy,  pure  in  his  life,  but  holding  all  human  au- 
thority in  contempt,  became  a  disturber  of  the  public  peace,  and  had  to  leave. 
Their  State  constituted  a  body  of  believers ;  the  elect  alone  were  citizens  : 
they  were  determined  that  their  communities  should  remain  pure  from  all 
these  disturbing  elements.  They  had  themselves  become  exiles  to  gain  this 
great  boon,  and  they  were  determined  never  to  surrender  it :  and  they  never 
did.  Roger  Williams  himself  acknowledged  at  last  the  justice  of  it,  and  re- 
tired, setting  a  higher  example  of  illuminated  statesmanship  and  sublime 
Christian  charity.  William  Penn,  with  marvellous  judgment  and  sagacity,  saw 
and  felt  it  all.  He  proposed  on  a  large  scale,  what  Roger  Williams  had  done 
on  a  smaller  one.  Coming  half  a  century  later,  when  the  whole  American 
question  was  fully  understood ;  when  the  great  revolution  in  England  was 
completed  ;  when  all  the  new  light  of  the  age  had  been  poured  upon  govern- 
ment and  human  rights,  he  could,  under  better  auspices,  with  the  favor  of  men 
in  power,  get  a  vast  territory  for  the  asking,  and  lay  out  a  State,  liberal  and 
grand  enough  to  suit  his  ideal  of  a  free  commonwealth. 

1  It  was  in  self-defense  that  Puritanism  in  America  party,  and  waged  against  it  a  war  of  extermination  ;  Puri- 

began  those  transient  persecutions  of  which  the  ex-  tanism  excluded  them  from  its  asylum.     Roger  Wil- 

cesses  shall  find  in  me  no  apologist ;  and  which  yet  liams,  the  apostle  of,  '  soul-liberty,'  weakened  die  cause 

were  no  more  than  a  train   of  mists,  hovering,  of  an  of  civil  independence  by  impairing  its  unity ;  and  he 

autumn  morning,  over  the  channel  of  a  fine  river,  that  was  expelled,  even  though  Massachusetts  always  bore 

diffused  freshness  and  fertility  wherever  it  wound.  The  good  testimony  to  his  spotless  virtues.     Wheelwright 

people  did  not  attempt  to  convert  others,  but  to  protect  and  his  friends,  in  their  zeal  for  strict  Calvinism,  for- 

themselves  ;  they   never  published   opinion   as   such  ;  got  their  duty  as  citizens,  and  they  also  were  expelled, 

they  never  attempted   to    torture  or   terrify  men   into  The  Anabaptist,  who  could  not  be  relied  upon  as  an 

orthodoxy.      The    history   of  religious  persecution    in  ally,  was  guarded  as  a  foe.     The  Quakers  denounced 

New   England  is    simply   this  : — the  Puritans    estab-  the  worship  of  New  England  as  an  abomination,  and 

lished  a  government  in  America   such  as  the  laws  of  its  government  as  treason  ;  and  therefore  they  were 

natural  justice  warranted,  and  such  as  the  statutes  and  excluded  on  pain  of  death.     The  fanatic  for  Calvinism 

common  law  of  England  did  not  warrant;  and  that  was  a  fanatic  for  liberty;  and  he  defended  his  creed; 

was  done  by  men  who  still  acknowledged  the  duty  of  for  in  the  moral  warfare  for  freedom,  his  creed  was  a 

a  limited  allegiance  to  the  parent  state.     The   Episco-  part  of  his  army,  and  his  most  faithful  ally  in  the  bat- 

pahans  had  declared  themselves  the   enemies  of  the  de.— Bancroft,  vol.  i.,  p.  463-4. 


H2  THE  PURITANS  AND    US    CONTRASTED. 

Our  age  offers  no  standard  by  which  the  Puritans  can  be  judged  as  civil- 
ians, only  in  their  conceptions  of  the  inviolability  of  human  liberty,  and  the 
dignity  and  sacredness  of  the  individual  soul, — in  all  of  which  they  far  tran- 
scended our  most  enlightened  ideas  ;  while  in  virtue,  sturdy  as  the  Romans 
understood  it — courage,  loyalty  to  the  gods,  fidelity  to  the  commonweal,— 
in  the  vigilance  with  which  they  guarded  public  morals ;  in  the  purity  of  their 
private  life ;  in  the  tenderness  and  love  of  their  social  relations ;  in  their  sub- 
lime devotion  to  God;  in  the  sacredness  with  which  they  guarded  their  altars; 
the  inviolability  with  which  they  surrounded  their  hearths  and  homes ;  in  the 
patient  industry  which  wrung  from  a  reluctant  soil  the  wealth  which  secured 
independence  ;  in  economy  and  self-denial,  and  in  industry  that  never  tired  : — 
those  men  and  women  stand  sublime  in  the  presence  of  an  age  where  prodi- 
gality is  substituted  for  thrift ;  where  speculation  pushes  aside  honest  enter- 
prise ;  where  luxury  scorns  frugality ;  where  indolence  looks  down  on  labor  ; 
where  the  stern  integrity  that  grows  out  of  the  fear  of  God  as  the  Supreme 
Judge  of  the  earth,  and  the  friend  and  vindicator  of  virtue,  have  given  way  to 
laxness  of  morals ;  where  selfishness  is  the  law,  and  generosity  the  exception  ; 
where  even  Christian  charity  itself  is  prostituted  under  the  name  of  a  liberality 
which  garnishes  crime  and  compromises  with  iniquity ;  where  money  is  the 
god  of  idolatry ;  where  even  women  of  boasted  refinement  and  culture,  have 
almost  lost  the  sentiment  of  maternity ;  where  large  families  are  growing  scarce, 
and  family  bonds  weaker ;  where  desertion  takes  place  with  the  slightest  pro- 
vocation, and  divorce  is  invoked  as  the  sovereign  panacea  for  every  marital 
ill ;  where  household  thrift  and  scrupulous  cleanliness,  have  ceased  to  char- 
acterize our  American  homes  ;  where  the  education  of  children  is  turned  over 
to  the  schoolmaster  and  the  governess ;  where  well-regulated  households 
filled  with  cheerfulness  and  plenty,  hospitality,  reverence  for  parents,  purity 
of  private  character,  the  culture  of  gentleness,  and  the  whole  galaxy  of  do- 
mestic virtues  and  graces,  have  all  but  gone  out  of  fashion  ; — where  love  gives 
place  in  marriage  to  a  settlement  for  life  ;  where  home  is  no  longer  the  centre 
of  attraction,  but  society  becomes  its  miserable  substitute  ;  where  friendships 
are  quick  struck,  and  short-lived ;  where  a  solid,  manly  character,  growing 
like  an  oak,  stronger  and  more  venerable  by  time,  is  no  longer  the  standard 
of  manhood  ;  where  men  in  high  office  steal,  and  debauch  public  morals  ; — 
And  yet,  in  so  fearful  a  social  condition  as  our  society  presents  to  day,  we 
go  back  and  rail  at  those  God-fearing,  noble  men ;  those  matronly  women, 
who  were  clothed  with  the  dignity,  the  graces,  the  beauties  and  the  glories 
of  pure  and  gentle  womanhood. 

Would  to  God  that  when  we  had  at  last  grown  into  a  system  of  govern- 
ment— which  by  the  common  consent  of  the  best  men  of  the  world  was  nearer 
a  model  of  perfection  than  had  yet  been  reached — we  could  have  preserved 
those  primitive  virtues  ;  that  feeling  of  reverence  for  the  Creator ;  that  regard 
for  justice ;  that  unbending  adherence  to  honesty  they  had  :  that  while,  in 
getting  rid  of  the  severity  of  the  Levitical  law,  we  had  preserved  the  tendei 


FALSE   JUDGMENTS  OF   THEIR    CHARACTER.  113 

charities  of  the  law  of  Christian  love ;  that  while  we  enlarged  the  pale  of  re- 
ligious toleration,and  even  went  beyond  it, — basing  the  law  in  America  upon 
the  duties  of  Christian  States  not  only  to  tolerate  but  to  protect  all  religions, — 
we  had  not  become  ourselves  indifferent  to  any  ;  that  we  could  have  preserved 
the  thrift  and  frugality  of  the  household,  the  sacredness  of  the  honor,  and  the 
depth  of  the  sentiment  of  maternity  among  women  ;  that  in  the  strain  for 
modern  culture,  the  sentiment  of  delicacy  itself  should  not  have  been  impaired ; 
that  we  might  still  have  had  sons  growing  up  like  pillars,  and  daughters  like 
plants  around  our  table,  instead  of  having  them  fly  early  from  the  family 
circle,  to  test  the  world  before  they  could  resist  its  enchantments, — to  try  the 
struggle  of  life  and  be  broken  on  the  wheel  before  they  are  strong  enough  to 
go  alone ;  to  spring  from  ignorance  into  the  ostentation  of  learning ;  to  sub- 
stitute— in  a  single  word — an  infinite  sham  for  an  eternal  verity.  This  is  the 
modern  society  that  undertakes  to  sit  in  judgment  over  the  men  that  founded 
the  Commonwealths  of  America  ;  that  laid  the  hewn  stone  so  deep  upon  the 
bed-rock  of  principle,  that  we  have  to  recur  to  them  now  for  whatever  we  need 
of  strength  and  cohesion  to  hold  our  Union  together.  For  now,  in  inculcating 
the  virtues  of  citizenship,  we  must  go  back  a  generation  or  two  for  examples 
in  illustration.  No  :  instead  of  dragging  the  founders  of  America  up  to  our 
standard,  in  God's  name,  let  us  go  back  to  theirs.  To  them  are  we  indebted 
for  whatever  we  now  have  of  things  of  inestimable  value  that  belong  to  life, 
in  the  close  of  the  first  century  of  our  national  existence.1 

King  Philips  War,  July  4,  1675.* — But.  while  the  colonies  were  relieved 
from  all  solicitude  about  English  interference,  and  they  saw  with  delight  the 

1  I  have  dwelt  the  longer  on  the  character  of  the  early  2  I  was  interrupted  in  the  final  revision  of  these 
Puritans  of  New  England,  for  they  are  the  parents  of  paragraphs,  by  the  painful  news  of  the  dreadful  flood 
one-third  the  whole  white  population  of  the  United  which  day  before  yesterday  (Saturday,  May  16,  1874) 
States.  Within  the  first  fifteen  years, — and  there  turned  the  upper  portion  of  the  valley  of  the  Con- 
never  was  afterwards  any  considerable  increase  from  necticut  into  a  vale  of  death.  A  spectator  of  the  tra- 
England, — we  have  seen  that  there  came  over  twenty-  gedy  thus  recalls  some  of  the  heart-chilling  scenes 
one  thousand  two  hundred  persons,  or  four  thousand  which  were  witnessed  in  that  fair  region  two  centuries 
families.     Their  descendants  are  now  not  far  from  four  ago  : 

millions  [more  than  double  since  Bancroft  wrote  these  '  The  valley  of  the  Connecticut  and  the  numerous 
words].  Each  family  has  multiplied  on  the  average  to  smaller  valleys  that  debouch  into  it  on  each  side  were, 
one  thousand  souls.  To  New  York  and  Ohio,  where  in  the  early  days  of  their  setdement,  used  to  irruptions 
they  constitute  half  the  population,  they  have  carried  more  destructive,  as  they  were  more  frequent,  than  a 
the  Puritan  system  of  free  schools  ;  and  their  example  sudden  rush  of  water.  Hatfield,  Deerfiekd,  and  North- 
is  spreading  it  through  the  civilized  world.  field   are  names  connected   with   bloody   memories  of 

Historians  have  loved  to  eulogize  the  manners  and  King  Philip's  war,  in  the  seventeenth  century.     Had- 

virtues;  the  glory  and  the  benefits,  of  chivalry.      Puri-  ley  is  another  name  made  memorable  in  the  time  of 

tanism  accomplished  for  mankind  far  more.      If  it  had  savage  warfare.     It  was  this  place  that  the  Indians  at- 

the   sectarian    crime  of  intolerance,    chivalry  had    the  tacked  one  smiling  Sabbath  morning  in  1675,  when  the 

vices  of  dissoluteness.     The  knights  were  brave  from  Puritans  were  at  worship.     The  whites  were   almost 

gallantry  of  spirit ;  the  Puritans  from  the  fear  of  God.  paralyzed.     They  saw  with  dread  the  yelling  savages 

The  knights  were  proud   of  loyalty  ;    the  Puritans  of  applying  torches  to  their  houses,  and  lacked  resolution 

liberty.  The  knights  did  homage  to  monarchs,  in  whose  to  abandon  for  a  moment  their  wives  and  children  to 

smile  they  beheld  honor,  whose  rebuke  was  the  wound  drive  them  off.     Suddenly  a  venerable,  white-haired 

of  disgrace  ;  the  Puritans,  disdaining  ceremony,  would  man    appeared    at   the   church    door,    and,    waving   a 

not  bow  at  the  name  of  Jesus,  nor   bend  the  knee  to  sword,  lured  them  out  against  the  Indians.     When  the 

the  King  of  kings.      Chivalry  delighted    in    outward  battle  was  over,  and  the  savages  had  been  driven  off, 

show,   favored  pleasure,   multiplied   amusements,  and  the  people  looked  for  the  old  man  who  was  their  savior, 

degraded  the  human  race  by  an  exclusive  respect  for  He  had  gone,  however,  and  it  was  not  known  for  many 

the  privileged  classes  ;  Puritanism  bridled  the  passions,  years  that  he  was  Goffe,  the  regicide,  who  long  before 

commanded  the  virtues  of  self-denial,  and  rescued  the  had  fled  before  the  emissaries  of  Charles  II.,  and  who, 

name  of  man  from  dishonor.     The  former  valued  cour-  for   several   years,    had  found  a  refuge  near   Hadley, 

tesy  ;    the  latter,  justice.      The  former  adorned  society  the  town  which  he   saved   from  destruction.       In  this 

by  graceful  refinements  ;    the  latter  founded   national  vicinity,   also,   is    Bloody  Brook,   where,    in   1676,   the 

grandeur  on  universal  education.      The  institutions  of  Indians  surprised  and  massacred  ninety  of  the  valiant 

chivalry  were    subverted    by  the  gradually-increasing  young  soldiers  of  the  sparsely  settled  valleys.     Edward 

weight,  and  knowledge,  and  opulence  of  the  industrious  Everett  has  embalmed   the  incidents  connected  with 

classes  ;    the   Puritans,    rallying  upon   those   classes,  that  massacre  in  the  most  perfect  of  oratorical  ek> 

planted  in  their  hearts  the  undying  principles  of  demo-  quence.' 
cratic  liberty. — Bancroft,  vol.  i.  p.   467-9. 

8 


H4  COMMENCEMENT  OF  KING  PHILIP'S   WAR. 

growth  of  Republican  principles  in  England,  they  had  cause  for  serious  appre- 
hensions at  home.  Troubles  came  upon  them  which  they  had  neither  pro- 
voked, nor  found  themselves  able  to  resist.  The  hour  had  come  for  testing 
the  supremacy  of  the  English  colonists  over  the  native  possessors  of  the  soil. 
Serious  strife  was  inevitable.  The  Indians  found  themselves  fading  away ;  and 
maddened  to  desperation  by  the  thought  of  their  approaching  fate,  the  least 
cause  of  irritation  might  bring  on  a  collision.1  Under  a  provocation  which 
had  enraged  the  young  Indians,  they  had  revenged  themselves  by  the  murder 
of  several  of  the  colonists  in  the  neighborhood  of  Swansey.  When  King  Philip 
heard  that  white  men's  blood  had  been  shed,  his  manhood  gave  way  to  tears. 
He  could  not  restrain  the  ferocity  of  his  warriors  ;  war  had  begun.  Within 
a  few  days,  volunteers  from  the  Plymouth  and  Massachusetts  colonies — June 
9,  1675 — nad  gathered  in  sufficient  force  to  drive  the  Pocanokets  from 
their  stronghold,  Mount  Hope,  and  Philip  had  fled  into  the  interior  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, to  rouse  all  the  surrounding  tribes  to  a  war  of  extermination. 
The  country  of  the  Narragansets  was  invaded,  and  the  Indians  fled.  But 
they  soon  rallied  under  Canonchet,  their  chief  sachem.  He  was  the  son  of 
Miantonomah,  and  the  grandson  of  Massasoit,  who  had  been  the  first  to 
welcome  the  Pilgrims  on  the  coast  of  Plymouth.  The  wrongs  of  the  young 
king  seemed  too  great  even  for  revenge,  and»he  fired  his  tribe  with  the  same 
spirit.  There  was  to  be  no  open  warfare ;  they  were  to  lurk  around  the 
settlements,  and  like  beasts  of  prey,  spring  upon  every  defenceless  dwelling. 
Hiding  in  swamps  by  night,  and  skulking  through  thickets  by  day,  singly  or 
in  small  parties,  every  settlement  in  Massachusetts  was  marked  out  for  ruin. 
The  local  Annals  of  that  region  record  more  instances  of  female  heroism  than 
embellish  almost  any  other  period  in  the  history  of  the  Indian  wars  of  America. 

For  more  than  a  year,  not  a  colonist  in  New  England  slept  sound  at  night. 
4  They  hung,'  says  Washington  Irving,  '  along  the  skirts  of  the  English  settle- 
ments, like  the  lightning  on  the  edge  of  the  clouds.'  Brookfield,  Deerfield, 
and  Springfield  were  burned.  Hadley  was  for  a  moment  saved  by  what  seemed 
an  intervention  from  heaven.  While  the  inhabitants  were  gathered  in  their 
church  on  Sunday  and  engaged  in  public  worship,  a  venerable  man,  with  white 
flowing  locks  and  beard,  suddenly  appeared,  brandishing  a  sword,  and 
screamed — '  The  Indians  are  descending  on  your  village  !  Leave  this  altar 
of  God,  and  follow  me  ! '  The  savages  were  met  and  defeated.  The  terror- 
stricken  inhabitants  believed  that  he  was  a  messenger  of  heaven,  sent  to  their 
rescue.     He  disappeared  as  suddenly  as  he  came,  and  was  never  seen  again. 

1  The  aged  Massasoit — he  who  had  welcomed  the  As  population  pressed  upon  other  savages,  the  west 

Pilgrims  to  the  soil  of  New  England,  and  had  opened  was  open  ;  but  as  the  English  villages  drew  nearer  and 

his  cabin  to  snelter  the  founder  of  Rhode  Island — now  nearer  to  them,  their  hunting-grounds  were  put  under 

slept  with  his  fathers  ;  and  his  son,  Philip  of  Pokano-  culture  ;  and    as    the    ever-urgent   importunity   of  the 

ket,  had  succeeded   him  as  chief  over  allied   tribes.  English  was  quieted  but  for  a  season  by  partial  conces- 

Repeated  sales  of  land  had  narrowed   their  domains,  sions  from  the  unwary  Indians,  their  natural  parks  were 

and   the  English  had  artfully  crowded  them  into  the  turned  into  pastures  ;  their  best  fields  for  planting  corn 

tongues  of  land,  as  'most  suitable  and  convenient  for  were  gradually  alienated  ;  their  fisheries  were  impaired 

them.'     There  they  could  be  more  easily  watched,  for  by  more  skilful  methods  ;  and,  as  wave  after  wave  suc- 

the  frontiers  of  the  narrow  peninsulas  were  inconsidera-  ceeded,  they  found  themselves  deprived  of  their  broad 

ble.    Thus  the  two  chief  seats  of  the  Pokanokets  were  the  acres,  and,  by  their  own  legal  contracts,  driven,  as  it 

necks  of  land  which  we  now  call  Bristol  and  Tiverton,  were,  into  the  sea. — Bancroft,  vol.  ii.  p.  99. 


THE  SCOURGE   OF  FIRE  AND  DEATH.  115 

He  was  Goffe,  the  regicide,  so-called;  one  of  the  judges  who  had  condemned 
Charles  I.  to  the  block.  With  his  companion  Whalley,  he  had  escaped  from 
England  on  the  restoration,  with  a  price  upon  their  heads,  and  a  demand  on 
the  colonies  for  their  surrender  to  the  British  Government.  They  had  them- 
selves brought  to  Boston  the  news  ol  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.,  and  in 
their  exile  they  had  grown  old:  Recure  even  in  their  new  home;  living 
like  wild  men,  in  caves  and  secret  places  ;  seen  now  and  then  only  as  flitting 
ghosts  on  the  verge  of  the  settlements.  The  colonists  had  no  desire  to  de- 
liver these  regicides  to  certain  death,  nor  would  they  perhaps  have  been  able. 
But  they  paid  dearly  for  their  sympathy  with  them,  in  the  hatred  of  Charles 
II.  and  the  loyalist  party,  who  revived  the  most  stringent  provisions  of  the 
Navigation  Act ■ — an  easy  but  unworthy  mode  of  retaliation. 

The  scourge  of  fire  and  death  swept  from  Springfield  northward  up  the 
valley  of  the  Connecticut.  A  fierce  battle  was  fought  near  Deerfield,  on 
Bloody  Brook,  where  the  flower  of  the  young  men  of  that  part  of  Massachu- 
setts, at  the  cost  of  the  lives  of  the  most  of  their  number,  repulsed  the  sava- 
ges in  one  of  the  hardest  fought  battles  in  our  history.  The  settlements  had 
risen  as  one  man,  and  Philip  was  obliged  to  escape  to  Rhode  Island.  In 
violation  of  their  late  treaty,  the  Narragansets  received  him,  and  becoming 
his  allies,  some  three  thousand,  under  his  leadership,  had  collected  at  a  fort,, 
which  stood  in  a  swamp  on  an  island  a  short  distance  to  the  south-west  of  the 
village  of  Kingston.  Here  Philip  made  his  last  stand.  It  was  in  the  dead  of 
winter — December  29 — and  here  he  was  to  measure  his  force  with  the  more 
terrible  implements  of  civilized  men.  The  colonies  of  Massachusetts,  Ply- 
mouth, and  Connecticut  had  gathered  fifteen  hundred  fighting  men,  and  the 
fort,  its  vast  cluster  of  wigwams,  and  the  chief  force  of  the  Indians,  were 
doomed.  The  work  of  slaughter  and  fire  began.  The  village  was  in  a  blaze, 
and  a  thousand  warriors  were  slain  or  wounded  ;  hundreds  were  taken  prison- 
ers, and  women  and  children  perished  by  fire.  Canonchet  was  taken  pris- 
oner and  slain.  Philip  effected  his  escape,  with  the  fragment  of  the  Narra- 
gansets, and  fled  for  refuge  to  the  Nipmucks. 

But  the  war  was  not  over.  Early  in  the  spring  of  1676,  it  was  renewed 
with  still  fiercer  atrocities.  Groton,  Weymouth,  Lancaster,  Medfield,  and 
Marlborough,  in  Massachusetts,  and  Providence  and  Warwick  in  Rhode 
Island,  were  laid  in  ashes.  Wherever  the  Indians  could  be  found  in  consider- 
able bodies,  they  were  cut  to  pieces  ;  while  along  the  whole  theatre  of  war, 
stretching  over  three  hundred  miles,  brave  and  skilful  partisan  officers, — among 
whom  Benjamin  Church  was  the  most  distinguished, — hunted  the  scattered 
savages.  The  last  hour  for  mercy  had  passed.  The  Indians  must  be  sub- 
dued or  exterminated,  or  the  colonies  cease  to  exist.     During  the  next  few 

1  The   first    Navigation    Act,   by  the   Republican  minions,  whose  masters  and  at  least  three-fourths  ol 

Parliament,  prohibited  foreign  vessels  trading  to  the  the  crews  were  Englishmen ;  and  that  sugar,  tobacco, 

English  colonies.     This  was  partly  to  punish  the  sugar-  and  other  colonial  commodities  should  be  imported  intc 

producing  islands  of  the  West  Indies,  because  the  peo-  no  part  of  Europe,  except  England  and  her  dominions, 

pie  were  chiefly  loyalists.     The  act  of  1660  provided  The  trade  between  the  colonists,  now  struggling  foi 

that  no  goods  should  be  carried  to  or  from  any  English  prosperous  life,  was  also  taxed  for  the  benefit  of  Eng- 

colonies,  but  in  vessels  built  within  the  English  do-  land.—  Lossing's  History  of  the  United  States,  p.  109 


u6  DEATH  OF  PHILIP— NEW  JERSEY  SETTLED. 

months,  probably  three  thousand  were  killed,  or  had  submitted.  Philip  would 
listen  to  no  terns.  He  was  hunted  like,  a  wild  beast,  from  lair  to  lair.  When  one 
of  his  warriors  spoke  to  him  of  yielding  to  the  pale-faces,  Philip  clove  his  hand 
from  the  arm  with  a  lightning  stroke  of  his  tomahawk.  But  \  the  last  of  the 
Wampanoags ' — the  title  which  he  carrkd  to  his  grave — was  obliged  to  give 
out.  He  found  his  way  back  to  Mou™Hope,  which  held  the  bones  of  his 
fathers  j  and  there  he  was  still  pursued.  His  wife  and  sons  were  taken  prisoners. 
1  Now,'  he  exclaimed,  when  he  saw  them  led  away,  '  my  heart  breaks ;  I 
am  ready  to  die.'  The  stricken  chief  shut  himself  up  in  his  cabin,  where  he 
was  shot  by  a  traitor  of  his  own  tribe.  His  body  fell  into  the  hands  of  Captain 
Church,  who  struck  off  the  head  of  the  dead  chief  and  carried  it  away  as  a 
trophy.  ■  This  ends  the  King  Philip  war/  said  he,  as  he  swung  the  head  of 
the  Narraganset  sachem.  It  did.  The  last  indignity  was  heaped  upon  his 
body  ;  it  was  quartered,  and  pitched  away  as"  carrion.  His  only  son  was  sold 
as  a  slave,  and  carried  to  Bermuda.  The  Massachusetts  Historical  Society 
now  holds  Church's  sword : — it  was  the  last  one  that  was  drawn  in  the  King 
Philip  war.1 

New  Jersey,  1640. — The  first  settlement  was  begun  by  the  Danes  in  New 
Jersey  in  1622,  at  Bergen,  and  the  second  on  the  Delaware,  under  the  pro- 
tection of  the  New  Netherland  charter.  We  have  already  spoken  of  the  log 
fort,  Nassau,  built  by  the  Dutch,  below  Camden.  In  the  same  year,  four 
couples  who  had  been  married  on  the  voyage  from  Amsterdam,  settled  on 
the  site  of  Gloucester,  just  below  Fort  Nassau;  and  these  little  settlements 
were  the  beginning  of  west  New  Jersey.  In  16 13,  Michael  Pauvv  purchased 
from  the  Indians  the  title  to  Staten  Island  and  the  whole  land  extending  from 
Hoboken  to  the  Raritan  River,  to  the  whole  of  which  he  gave  the  name  Pavo- 
nia.  His  title  also  embraced  Bergen,  and  he  called  the  spot  we  now  know  as 
Jersey  City,  Paulus'  Hook.  After  the  English  had  become  possessors  of 
New  Netherland,  in  1664,  and  the  Duke  of  York,  who  owned  the  province, 
had  ceded  to  Sir  George  Carteret  and  Lord  Berkely  all  the  tract  lying 
between  North  and  East  Rivers, — then  called  the  Hudson  and  the  Delaware, 
— under  the  title  of  Nova  Caesarea,  Elizabethtown  was  settled  by  some 
families  from  Long  Island.  Philip  Carteret,  who  was  appointed  Governor  of 
the  new  province  in  1665,  brought  with  him  a  liberal  charter,  containing  the 
same  general  provisions  as  the  other  royal  provinces,  and  entering  upon  the 
administration  of  his  office  the  same  year,  the  commonwealth  of  New  Jersey 
began  her  existence. 

The  Temporary  Overthrow  of  the  French  Power  in  North  America. — 
In  1628,  Port  Royal,  which  was  little  more  than  a  small  trading  station 
for  the  French,  was  taken  by  the  English,  and  Sir  David  Kirke  was  sent  up 

1  Slavery  of  the  American  Indians  in  Europe. —  next  year  the  slavery  of  Indians  was  recognized  as  law- 
Many  of  the  early  navigators  to  America,  including  ful ;  and  the  practice  of  selling  the  natives  of  North 
Colunbus  himself,  carried  considerable  numbers  of  the  America  into  foreign  bondage  continued  for  nearly  two 
aborigines  to  Europe,  where  they  vere  sold  into  slavery,  centuries.  The  excellent  Winthrop  enumerates  Indiana 
Queen  Isabella  commanded  the  liberation  of  Indians  among  his  bequests. — Bancroft, 
held  in  bondage  in  her  possessions  in  1501 — but  the 


THREATENED  RUIN  OF  NEW  NETHERLAND.  1 17 

the  St.  Lawrence  to  take  possession  of  the  French  settlements.  They  had 
been  nearly  reduced  to  starvation,  and  on  the  first  summons  Quebec  capitu- 
lated. This  completed  the  conquest  of  New  France,  its  capital  being  little 
more  than  a  barren  rock  surrounded  by  a  few  hovels ;  but  at  this  time  it  left 
the  French  without  a  port  in  North  America,  and  England  without  a  rival. 
But  by  virtue  of  a  treaty  of  April  14,  1629,  between  England  and  France, 
these  possessions  were  restored.  Their  boundaries,  however,  were  not 
clearly  enough  defined,  which  led  to  future  collisions,  resulting  finally  in  the 
great  French  and  Indian  war. 

Threatened  Ruin  of  New  Netherland  under  Kief V s  Administration. — The 
colony  had  been  brought  to  the  verge  of  ruin  under  the  merciless 
and  brutal  administration  of  Kieft.  He  wantonly  outraged  the  surrounding 
Indians  by  acts  of  injustice,  and  abetted  the  traders  whose  plunders  he 
shared,  in  their  depredations  on  the  Indians.  Mean  in  all  other  things,  he 
was  profuse  only  in  furnishing  brandy  to  entrap  them  into  ruinous  bargains, 
and  madden  them  to  vengeance  after  they  woke  from  the  debauch.  At  the 
first  sign  of  retaliation  they  were  proclaimed  outlaws,  and  rewards  were  offered 
for  every  scalp  brought  into  the  fort.  Remonstrances  from  the  colonists  were 
unheeded.  An  old  chieftain  of  the  River  tribe  had  said  to  the  Governor, 
in  the  presence  of  his  council,  'You  are  yourselves  the  cause  of  all  these 
evils  :  you  ought  not  to  craze  the  young  Indians  with  brandy.'  Passionate 
and  implacable,  he  resolved  to  wipe  out  the  native  tribes  by  a  general 
massacre.  Many  of  the  chiefs,  who  had  met  for  council  on  the  New 
Jersey  shore,  were  surprised  in  the  darkness  of  night,  and  massacred  in  their 
wigwams.  At  daylight  the  next  morning,  the  survivors  were  seen  dragging 
their  mangled,  bleeding,  and  half-frozen  bodies  over  the  snow,  and  frantic 
mothers  plunged  after  their  children,  who  had  been  thrown  into  the  river 
before  their  very  eyes.     The  victims  numbered  over  a  hundred. 

But  the  revenge  was  swift  and  awful.  The  terrible  Mohawks,  whose 
ancient  sovereignty  over  the  Algonquin  tribes  in  the  neighborhood  of  New 
York  had  been  disputed,  were  now  greeted  as  deliverers  as  they  came 
to  the  rescue.  '  War,  to  the  death  ! ' — was  the  cry  that  rang  along  the 
shores  of  the  Hudson,  New  Jersey,  Long  Island,  and  the  Connecticut 
frontier.  For  two  years  the  fires  of  blazing  dwellings  over  the  whole  region, 
lit  up  the  heavens  as  surely  as  the  stars  themselves.  Not  only  most  of  the 
surrounding  settlements  had  dwellings  burned,  women  butchered,  and  chil- 
dren kidnapped,  but  the  white  population  of  Manhattan  Island  itself  was 
threatened  with  extinction.  The  colony  now  rose  against  the  author  of  their 
misery,  and  demanded  his  recall.  He  was  allowed  to  gather  the  fruits  of  his 
extortion  on  a  vessel,  with  which  he  sailed  for  Holland.  But  he  was  not  to 
enjoy  his  plunder.  What  could  not  be  visited  upon  him  by  the  power  of 
man,  was  effected  by  the  justice  of  God.  A  storm  dashed  his  homeward- 
bound  vessel  on  the  coast  of  Wales,  and  he  and  his  booty  were  swallowed 
up  in  the  waves  : — another  of  the  many  instances  recorded,  of  the  justly 


n8  THE  HISTORY  OF  NEW  YORK  BEGINS. 

deserved  doom  of  the  plundering  and  bloody  tyrants  of  the  early  settlements 
of  America. 

Peter  Stuyvesant  assumes  Control  as  Governor  of  New  Netherlands  May 
27,  1647. — He  was  a  distinguished  soldier,  who  had  been  called  from  the 
government  of  Curacoa,  where  he  had  displayed  the  firmness  and  integrity 
that  now  commanded  confidence  and  admiration.  His  was  one  of  those  brave, 
primitive  characters  which  abounded  among  the  Hollanders  of  those  days. 
Generous,  unsuspecting,  large-hearted;  blunt,  indeed,  but  genial  and  hu- 
mane, both  the  colonists  and  the  natives  understood  that  while  he  had  the 
kindness  of  a  father,  he  had  the  firmness  of  a  judge.  There  could  be  no 
robbery,  cheating,  or  injustice  where  he  was.  Loyal  to  the  West  India 
Company,  he  was  still  more  loyal  to  justice.  When  his  instructions  did  not 
suit  him  he  violated  them «  if  the  laws  were  wrong,  he  made  laws  that  were 
right.  He  was  diplomatic,  withal.  Finding  the  Connecticut  men  too  strong 
for  him,  he  gave  up  all  claim  further  east,  and  contented  himself  within  the 
limits  of  Oyster  Bay  on  Long  Island,  and  Greenfield  in  Connecticut.  The 
chief  object  of  his  ambition,  however,  was  to  reduce  the  pretensions  of  the 
Swedes;  and,  ignoring  their  claims  altogether,  in  165 1  he  built  Fort  Cassi- 
mir,  where  Newcastle,  in  Delaware,  now  stands.  The  Swedes,  however,  were 
strong  enough  to  seize  the  garrison.  But  the  government  of  the  States- 
General  stood  by  him,  and  furnished  him  aid.  In  August,  1665,  with  six 
hundred  men,  he  sailed  for  the  Delaware,  seized  the  Swedish  fortresses,  made 
a  prisoner  of  the  governor  and  the  chief  men  of  New  Sweden,  and  sent  them 
back  to  Europe.  This  made  an  end,  not  of  their  settlements,  nor  their  pros- 
perity, but  of  their  political  power ;  and,  after  a  brief  existence  of  seventeen 
years,  New  Sweden  disappeared  from  the  map  of  North  America.  But  the 
Scandinavian  settlers  remained  and  prospered.  They  lost  their  nationality, 
but  the  subjects  of  Gustavus  Adolphus  became  good  American  citizens,  and 
to  them  can  be  traced  some  of  the  best  population  of  the  Delaware. 

The  English  take  Possession  of  New  Netherlands  and  the  History  of  New 
York  begins,  October,  1666. — Regardless  of  all  claims  or  rights  of  the  Dutch, 
Charles  II.,  in  the  spring  of  1664,  gave  away  the  territory  of  New  Netherland 
to  his  brother  James,  the  Duke  of  York  ;  and  sending  Col.  Richard  Nicolls 
with  a  squadron  to  enforce  the  decree,  almost  without  resistance,  on  the  3d 
of  September  of  the  same  year,  the  cross  of  St.  George  was  unfurled  over  the 
fort  of  New  Amsterdam,  and  the  name  of  the  place  changed  to  the  one  it  was 
ever  afterwards  to  bear.  Hereafter  there  was  to  be  new  life  here.  Holland 
had  lost  her  chance ;  the  hope  of  Scandinavian  empire  in  the  New  World  lay 
buried  in  the  grave  of  Gustavus  Adolphus ;  and  from  the  last  English  settle- 
ment in  Maine,  to  the  southern  border  of  the  Carolinas,  the  English  standard 
alone  floated.  On  the  17th  of  October,  1683,  a  Charter  of  Liberties  was 
established,  with  the  full  consent  of  Governor  Dongan,  who  had  been  in- 
structed by  the  Duke  of  York,  under  the  advice  of  William  Penn,  to  call  an  as- 


WILLIAM  PENN  AND  HIS   COLONY.  119 

sembly  of  the  represents  fives  of  the  people,  when  the  foundaticns  o/free  gov 
eminent  were  laid.  Threatened — threatened  indeed,  by  that  same  Duke  of 
York  when  he  became  James  II. ;  but  James  II.  was  to  be  driven  from  his 
throne,  and  die  in  exile,  while  the  commonwealth  that  was  afterwards  to  be 
known  as  the  Empire  State  was  beginning  to  assert  her  commercial  and 
political  dominion. 

William  Penn  and  his  Pennsylvania  Colony. — It  was  a  much  greater  thing 
to  be  a  Quaker  in  that  age  than  most  men  now  suppose.-  The  Quakers 
were  the  children  of  the  great  Reformation  which  had  emancipated  half  of 
Europe,  and  was  afterwards  to  emancipate  the  rest.  They  alone,  of  all 
men,  carried  its  legitimate  principles  out  to  their,  logical  conclusion,  in 
religion  and  morals,  as  well  as  in  government.  The  human  soul  had  never 
been  allowed  to  come  in  direct  intercourse  with  its  Maker ;  it  stood  afar  off, 
and  trusted  to  the  intervention  of  a  third  party  for  the  adjustment  of  all  its 
concerns.  The  awed  worshipper  crept  distrustfully  across  the  threshold  of  the 
temple,  and  waited  for  the  mitred  priest  to  pass  within  the  vail.  The  Quakers 
rejected  all  this  ;  they  took  Jesus  of  Nazareth  at  his  word ;  and  in  the  New 
Testament  they  found  their  magna  charta  : 

Seeing  that  we  have  a  great  High  Priest,  that  has  passed  in- 
to THE  HEAVENS,  JESUS,  THE  SON  OF  GOD,  LET  US  HOLD  FAST  OUR  PRO- 
FESSION. 

For  we  have  not  a  High  Priest  which  cannot  be  touched  with 
the  feeling  of  our  infirmities  ;  but  was  in  all  points  tempted  like 
as  we  are,  yet  without  sin. 

Let  us  therefore  come  boldly  unto  the  throne  of  grace,  that 
WE  MAY  obtain  mercy,  and  find  grace  to  help  in  every  time  of  need. 

Wherefore  He  is  able  also  to  save  them  to  the  uttermost  that 
come  unto  God  by  him,  seeing  he  ever  liveth  to  make  intercession 
for  them. 

For  such  a  High  Priest  became  us,  who  is  holy,  harmless, 
undefiled,    separate    from    sinners,    and    made    higher    than    the 

HEAVENS. 

Who  needeth  not  daily,  as  those  High  Priests,  to  offer  up 
sacrifice,  first  for  his  own  sins,  and  then  for  the  people's  :  for 
this  he  did  once,  when  he  offered  up  himself. 

Wherefore  we  receiving  a  kingdom  which  cannot  be  moved,  let 
us  have  grace  whereby  we  may  serve  god  acceptably,  with  rever- 
ence, and  godly  fear. 

This  is  the  true  light,  that  lighteth  every  man  that  cometh 
into  the  world. 

With  this  charter  in  his  hand,  the  Quaker  moved  with  covered  head, 
:almly  and  majestically  by  the  long  lines  of  priests,  hierarchs,  and  kings,, 
casti  ig  mitre,  missal,  and  creed  behind  him,  and  went  boldly,  though  meekly, 
into  the  presence  of  the  King  of  kings — only  one  object  of  supreme  ado- 


i2o  WILLIAM  PENN  AND    THE   QUAKERS, 

ration ;    only  one  mediator   between  heaven  and  earth,  —  the  mar.    Christ 
Jesus. 

What  could  a  poor  fallible  being  like  himself,  though  crowned  with  a 
thousand  mitres,  consecrated  never  so  many  times  with  sacred  oil,  do  for 
such  a  man  as  George  Fox  ?  In  such  business  as  this,  how  small  did  the 
poor  priqst  appear.  At  the  foot  of  the  throne  of  the  Eternal,  what  tinselled 
stuff  were  baubles  of  jeweller's  coronets,  and  holy  vestments  of  Pontiff,  and 
incense  burning  before  human  altars.  That  any  mortal  should  stand  between 
the  soul  and  its  father,  God,  was  blasphemy. 

If  Copernicus  had  found  his  way  to  the  sun  as  the  central  throne  of  the 
solar  system,  George  Fox  had  found  direct  access  to  the  throne  of  the  uni- 
versal Father.  He  *had  discovered  a  new  spiritual  world  ;  known,  it  is  true, 
to  the  earlier  Christians  before  theology  had  been  substituted  for  the  Gospel 
of  Christ ;  and  this  divine  light  which  had  illuminated  the  souls  of  many  of 
the  gifted  children  of  the  earth  could  not  be  quenched ;  for  in  all  nations  'he 
had  those  who  feared  him.'  Luther  was  a  mightier  reformer ;  nor  did 
George  Fox  surpass  or  eclipse  the  virtue  and  purity  of  the  Puritans,  whose 
religious  creed  he  adopted,  and  more,  for  he  was  the  Puritan  of  the  Puritans. 
But  he  was  more  radical ;  he  went  further  than  they ;  he  lingered  not  so  long 
in  the  gloomy  shadows  of  a  revolting  Calvinism.  Beyond  where  even  they 
had  penetrated,  he  boldly  pushed  his  way ;  groping  no  longer  an  orphan  in  a 
flaming  but  bewildering  universe,  he  discovered  and  adopted  in  his  very  heart 
of  hearts  the  fatherhood  of  God,  and  the  complete  brotherhood  of  humanity. 

Such  was  the  creed,  such  the  charter,  such  the  life  of  George  Fox,  the 
founder  of  the  people  called  Quakers ;  such  was  William  Penn,  one  of  his 
early,  and  the  greatest  of  his  disciples. 

Europe  was  no  place  for  such  a  plant  as  this.  In  the  midst  of  royalty  the 
proudest,  hierarchy  the  most  audacious,  of  superstition  the  most  abject,  and 
despotism  the  most  merciless,  it  could  not  flourish  ;  it  must  find  a  new  world. 
Penn  brought  it  to  America,  and  planted  it  on  the  fair  banks  of  the  Delaware. 

And  thus,  one  by  one,  the  fruits  of  all  the  struggles  of  all  the  nations 
through  all  the  ages,  were  to  be  gathered  here.  No  martyr  for  liberty  any- 
where had  died  in  vain ;  no  devout  seeker  after  truth  sought  in  vain ;  no 
seer  of  better  days  to  come,  had  prophesied  in  vain.  Already  the  future 
was  advancing  up  to  meet  him.  Shakespeare,  Fox,  Cromwell,  Milton, 
Bacon,  Brewster,  Williams,  Penn,  Whitfield,  Edwards,  Wesley !  These  men 
held  the  golden  skirts  of  the  Millennium  in  their  hands. 

William  Penn  was  no  needy  adventurer ;  he  sprang  from  no  obscure 
origin.  His  father  was  an  Admiral  in  the  British  navy.  His  ancestors  were 
fighting  sailors  ;  they  received  instructions  from  kings  direct  While  William 
was  a  student  at  Oxford,  at  the  age  of  seventeen,  and  Cromwell  held  the 
government  of  England,  Penn  was  reading  the  story  of  the  infant  colonies 
of  America.     From  this  source  he  borrowed  the  light  that  guided  him  in  his 


WILLIAM   PENN. 


TENN'S  HISTORY— IMPRISONMENTS.  121 

future  career.  Born  with  a  spirit  that  made  liberty  of  thought  and  freedom 
of  action  the  imperative  conditions  of  his  life,  his  soul  loathed  the  shams  of 
a  political  church.  He  heard  Quaker  preaching.  His  heart  was  touched, 
and  he  was  brought  into  '  the  liberty  wherewith  Christ  maketh  free.'  His 
father,  a  churchman  as  well  as  a  sailor,  intense  in  his  loyalty,  ■  would  have 
nothing  of  this.'  He  took  him  from  his  college,  beat  him,  turned  him  into 
the  streets,  and  discarded  him  forever.  He  could  be  restored  to  favor  only 
by  renouncing  his  'infamous  notions.'  But  he  was -an  only  son,  a  beautiful 
and  noble  boy ;  and  his  father,  like  a  true-hearted  sailor,  could  relent  some- 
what. He  gave  him  leave  to  travel  on  the  continent, — as  though  this  would 
cure  such  a  man  of  ■  infamous  notions,'  begotten  by  the  spirit  of  Everlasting 
Life  that  lighteth  every  man  that  cometh  into  the  world.  The  fire  on  that 
altar  was  kindled  by  celestial  hands,  and  was  never  to  go  out. 

In  1662  we  find  him  pursuing  his  studies  at  the  college  of  Saumer,  where 
the  learned  and  devout  Amyrault  indoctrinated  him  into  the  theology  of 
Calvin,  tempered  by  the  sweet  spirit  of  Christian  charity.  He  learned  the 
history  of  the  Huguenots  by  heart,  and  his  soul  went  out  to  them.  Recalled 
to  manage  the  estates  of  his  father,  he  pursued  the  study  of  law  at  Lin- 
coln's Inn.  Polished  in  manners,  adorned  with  every  grace  and  accomplish- 
ment, skilled  in  the  use  of  the  sword,  and  maturer  in  learning  than  his  years 
could  justify  ;  in  his  name  the  inheritor  of  wealth,  the  favor  of  his  sovereign, 
all  beckoned  him  to  a  future  as  fair  as  this  world  can  give.  But  he  says : 
'I  turned  away  with  a  deep  sense  of  the  vanity  of  the  world,  and  the  irre- 
ligiousness  of  its  religions.'  In  Ireland  he  heard  more  of  this  new  preaching. 
He  says  himself,  '  God  in  his  everlasting  kindness  guided  my  feet  in  the  flower 
of  my  youth,  when  about  two  and  twenty  years  of  age.'  He  remonstrated 
with  the  viceroy  of  Ireland  against  his  wickedness,  and  was  thrown  into  jail. 
His  only  defence  was,  '  Religion  is  my  crime  and  my  innocence.  It  makes 
me  a  prisoner  to  malice,  but  my  own  free  man.'  This  was  more  than  even 
his  fond  parent  could  stand,  and  on  reaching  his  home  he  turned  him  penni- 
less from  the  door.  Nothing  but  his  mother's  love  saved  him  from  begging 
his  bread.  He  could  contain  himself  no  longer.  He  seized  the  pen  and 
wrote  No  Cross,  no  Crown,  announcing  '  to  all  men  that  he  was  a  member 
of  that  despicable,  persecuted,  scoffed-at  society  called  Quakers.'  He  boldly 
went  to  the  palace,  wearing  his  hat  in  the  presence  of  courtiers,. and  plead 
the  cause  of  his  afflicted  brethren.  Stocks,  whips,  dungeons,  banishments, 
and  all  persecution  were  too  good  for  his  insulted  companions.  This 
time  he  was  cast  into  the  Tower.  A  threat  of  imprisonment  for  life  extorted 
no  recantation ; — ■  My  prison  shall  be  my  grave,'  was  his  answer.  Charles 
II.,  who  loved  his  father,  sent  a  friend  with  a  kind  message  to  the  son,  who 
plead  with  him.  'Tell  the  king,'  was  his  answer  to  these  long  and  affection- 
ate appeals  of  Stillingfleet,  i  that  the  Tower  is  to  me  the  worst  argument  in 
the  world ;  I  want  my  rights — the  natural  privileges  of  an  Englishman.' 

At  last  the  imprisonment  of  this  brilliant  and  talented  young  man  cast 


122  PENN  PREPARES   TO   COME.  TO  AMERICA. 

some  opprobium  upon  the  king  and  court.  His  manliness  had  extorted  thei« 
respect,  and  he  gained  the  favor  of  his  father.  But  even  he  was  too  proud  to 
petition  for  the  liberty  of  his  son.  The  Duke  of  York,  however — be  this  one 
good  thing  said  to  his  honor,  for  he  was  quite  a  promising  man,  till  he  became 
king — demanded  his  release.  But  in  less  than  twelve  months  he  was  found 
haranguing  at  Quaker  meetings  against  the  infamous  Conventicle  Act  that 
had  just  been  passed.  Remonstrated  with  again  :  l  Not  all  the  powers  on  earth 
shall  divert  us  from  meeting  to  adore  our  God  who  made  us.'  Summoned 
before  the  Recorder  of  London  on  a  charge  of  violating  a  supreme  law,  and 
the  jury  after  remaining  shut  up  two  days  and  nights,  without  refreshment, 
bringing  in  a  verdict  *  Not  guilty,'  the  Recorder  fined  the  prisoners  forty  marks 
apiece,  and  sent  Penn  back  to  prison.  That  jurist  volunteered  an  opinion 
also,  which  I  think  had  better  be  recorded  here,  for  fear  such  a  precious  scrap 
of  jurisprudence  should  be  lost.  '  It  never  will  be  well  with  us,'  he  said,  'till 
something  like  the  Spanish  Inquisition  shall  be  in  England.' 

The  old  Admiral  was  dying.  He  paid  the  fines,  and  called  the  boy  to  his 
side.  '  Son  William,  if  you  and  your  friends  keep  to  your  plain  way  of  preach- 
ing and  living,  you  will  make  an  end  of  the  priests.'  And  they  did  come  pretty 
near  it. 

He  buried  his  father,  inherited  his  vast  estate,  and  devoted  himself '  to 
God  and  the  cause  of  liberty  of  worship.'  His  pen  was  throwing  off  the  bold- 
est and  the  best  defences  for  conscience  that  had  ever  appeared.  Everywhere 
he  was  speaking  at  the  Quaker  meetings;  everywhere  defying  the  tyranny 
that  would  interfere  with  'the  freedom  of  the  children  of  God.'  This  time  he 
was  thrown  into  Newgate,  reeking  with  filth,  the  very  air  loaded  with  blas- 
phemy and  curses.  He  preached  to  his  companions  the  love  of  God,  and  the 
hope  of  Heaven.  From  his  cell  he  sent  to  Parliament  the  grandest,  perhaps, 
of  all  the  pleas  for  liberty  of  conscience  ever  written,  closing  his  argument 
with  these  words :  ■  If  we  cannot  obtain  the  olive-branch  of  toleration,  we 
bless  the  providence  of  God,  resolved  by  patience  to  outweary  persecution, 
and  by  our  constant  sufferings  to  obtain  a  victory  more  glorious  than  our 
adversaries  can  achieve  by  their  cruelties.' 

But  things  had  gone  too  far  in  England  not  to  meet  with  a  reaction.  To 
the  Puritans  and  the  Quakers,  to  Cromwell  and  the  Republican  party,  to  the 
great  thinkers  of  the  time,  to  the  fathers  of  English  literature  and  modern 
thought,  the  British  people  were  indebted  for  the  strong  convictions  of  the 
sacredness  of  personal  liberty  such  as  they  had  never  felt  before.  England 
was  advancing  rapidly  towards  greater  purity  in  morals,  and  higher  philosophy 
in  government.  No  more  such  scenes  of  persecution  were  to  be  witnessed  ; 
the  fires  of  Smithfield  were  never  again  to  be  relighted ;  imprisonment  for 
opinion's  sake  was  to  be  rarer;  liberty  was  growing  strong. 

Owing  to  Penn's  high  social  rank  and  wealth,  his  intimacy  with  such  men 
as  Russell,  Sunderland,  Halifax,  Shaftesbury,  Buckingham  and  Sidney;  a  com- 
panion of  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  and  a  member,  like  him,  of  the  Royal  Society, 
enjoying  the  companionship,  the  respect  and  the  sympathy  of  the  scholars  of 


PENNS  FIRST  TREATY  WITH  THE  INDIANS.  12 j 

his  age,  but  still  finding  less  scope  for  his  exertions  than  satisfied  his  ambi- 
tion to  serve  his  fellow-men,  which  was  the  purest  and  strongest  passion 
of  his  life,  he  formed  the  scheme  of  establishing  a  great  settlement  in 
America.  He  had  the  wealth  and  the  influence  to  secure  whatever  privilege 
he  desired.  He  wrote  a  charter  for  a  territory  now  known  as  the  State  of 
Pennsylvania ;  it  was  given  .to  him,  and  he  sailed  for  the  Delaware.  *  In 
that  new  land,'  he  said,  '  I  will  try  the  holy  experiment.' 

Penn  Reaches  America,  Oct.  27,  1682. — The  news  spread  rapidly  that 
'the  Quaker  King' had  reached  Newcastle.  On  the  day  after  his  landing, 
in  presence  of  a  crowd  of  Swedes,  Dutch,  and  English,  who  had  gathered 
round  the  court-house,  his  deeds  of  feoffment  were  produced ;  the  Duke  of 
York's  agents  '  surrendered  the  territory  by  the  solemn  delivery  of  earth 
and  water,'  and  Penn,  invested  with  supreme  and  undefined  power,  addressed 
the  assembled  multitude  on  government ;  recommended  sobriety  and  peace, 
and  pledged  himself  to  grant  liberty  of  conscience  and  civil  freedom. 

Pentis  first  Treaty  with  the  Indians — Nove?nber,  1682. — In  an  open 
boat,  with  a  few  companions,  clothed  in  his  simple  Quaker  costume,  and 
surrounded  with  all  the  emblems  of  peace,  Penn  landed  on  the  west  bank  of 
the  Delaware,  where  the  foundations  of  Philadelphia  were  soon  to  be  laid. 
Here  he  met  the  Indians  for  the  first  time.  Underneath  a  large  elm  tree,1 
a  numerous  delegation  of  the  Lenni  Lenape  tribe  had  already  assembled  to 
receive  their  sovereign.  Other  treaties  with  the  natives  of  the  continent  had 
been  for  the  purchase  of  lands  ;  but  this  was  for  a  higher  purpose.  They  had 
the  year  before  received  a  letter  from  the  great  proprietary,  through  William 
Markham,  his  agent,  declaring  himself  equally  responsible  with  them,  to  one 
and  the  same  God,  who  had  written  his  laws  in  their  hearts ;  and  that  they 
were  equally  bound  to  love,  and  help,  and  do  good  to  one  another.  Now 
he  had  come  to  redeem  his  word.  '  We  meet,'  he  said,  ■  on  the  broad  path- 
way of  good  faith  and  good  will ;  no  advantage  shall  be  taken  on  either  side, 
but  all  shall  be  openness  and  love.  I  will  not  call  you  xhildren  ;  for  parents 
sometimes  chide  their  children  too  severely :  nor  brothers  only ;  for  brothers 
differ.  The  friendship  between  me  and  you,  I  will  not  compare  to  a  chain  : 
for  that  the  rains  might  rust,  or  the  falling  tree  might  break.  We  are  the 
same  as  if  one  man's  body  were  to  be  divided  into  two  parts ;  we  are  all  one 
flesh  and  blood.' 

These  were  new  words  to  fall  from  the  lips  of  a  white  man  on  the  ears  of 
the  Indian.  They  were  prepared  for  friendly  assurances ;  but  when  they 
heard  them  uttered  with  the  dignity  and  earnest  tenderness  which  character- 
ized the  great  and  good  man  whom  they  talked  with,  all  the  ferocity  of  their 
savage  natures  melted  away.     The  rich  and  abundant  presents   were  then 

1  In  1810  tliis  venerable  elm  was  blown  down  in  a  ciety  of  Philadelphia  erected  a  monument,  which  is  to 
storm,  and  found  to  be  two  hundred  and  eighty-three  be  seen  near  the  intersection  of  Hanover  and  Beach 
years  old.     On  the  spot  where  it  stood,  the  Penn  So-    streets,  Kensington,  Philadelphia. 


124  HIS  HISTORY  IN  PENNSYLVANIA. 

opened.  The  chiefs  gathered  around,  and  as  they  handed  the  wampum  belt, 
they  declared,  'We  will  live  in  love  with  William  Penn,  and  his  children,  as 
long  as  the  moon  and  the  sun  shall  endure.'  And  there,  under  the  sheltering 
arms  of  the  broad  elm,  the  golden  sun  was  pouring  his  light  upon  the  strange 
group.  On  all  sides,  the  majestic  pines  were  shooting  their  tall  spires  into 
heaven.  The  squaws — their  pappooses  laid  carelessly  on  the  ground — 
were  inspecting  the  presents  with  all  the  curiosity  of  woman ;  while  the  stern 
old  warriors,  erect  as  the  monarchs  of  the  forest  around  them,  pledged  to  this 
messenger  of  peace  their  fidelity  forever.  At  evening  they  accompanied 
Penn  and  his  companions  to  the  boat ;  and  it  glided  away  over  the  bosom 
of  the  calm  Delaware,  on  its  return  to  Chester.  *  The  simple  sons  of  the 
wilderness,  returning  to  their  wigwams,  kept  the  history  of  the  covenant  by 
strings  of  wampum  j  and  long  afterwards,  in  their  cabins,  would  count  over 
the  shells  on  a  clean  piece  of  bark,  and  recall  to  their  own  memory,  and 
repeat  to  their  children,  or  to  the  stranger,  the  words  of  William  Penn.  New 
England  had  just  terminated  a  disastrous  war  of  extermination ;  the  Dutch 
were  scarcely  ever  at  peace  with  the  Algonquin s  ;  the  laws  of  Maryland  refer 
to  Indian  hostilities  and  massacres  which  extended  as  far  as  Richmond. 
Penn  came  without  arms  ;  he  declared  his  purpose  to  abstain  from  violence  ; 
he  had  no  message  but  peace :  and  not  a  drop  of  Quaker  blood  has  ever 
been  shed  by  an  Indian  to  this  day.' ! 

From  this  time,  Penn  became  a  beloved  name.  He  made  frequent  visits 
to  the  Indians  in  their  villages ;  he  enjoyed  the  simple,  but  large  hospitality 
of  their  cabins,  where  the  rude  tables  were  loaded  with  wild  game — deer 
from  the  forest,  birds  from  the  skies,  and  fish  from  the  streams.  The  yellow 
hominy,  and  the  roasted  acorns,  steamed  from  the  board,  and  their  drink  was 
the  crystal  water,  '  brewed  by  nature's  own  Arch-Chemist  in  his  cool  rocky 
hills.'  This  apostle  of  peace  entered  heartily  into  all  their  amusements  :  he 
joined  in  their  athletic  games ;  he  played  with  the  pappooses,  and  kissed  the 
tawny  cheeks  of  the  dreamy-eyed  maidens.  His  cheerful  laugh  was  always 
heard  from  the  cabin  where  mirth  and  frolic  were  going  on.  The  little 
savages  climbed  his  knees  and  learned  to  love  him. 

Nor  was  this  any  hollow  truce,  to  be  broken  by  either  party.  Right 
hearty  good-will  prevailed  between  the  proprietary  and  all  his  Indian  subjects. 
They  were  his  children,  and  he  was  their  loving  father.  Presents  of  wild 
game  were  continually  sent  to  him.  The  robes  of  bears  from  the  Pennsyl- 
vania forests,  and  the  skins  of  buffalo  from  the  distant  prairies,  were  their  un- 
failing offerings.  All  things  which  they  could  bestow  to  increase  comfort,  or 
heighten  luxury,  were  sent  to  his  dwelling ;  not  so  much  as  peace-offerings,  but 
rather,  as  tokens  of  filial  veneration  and  love.* 

Would  to  God  that  this  had  been  the  spirit  with  which  the  Christians  of 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ii.  p.  382.  blush  for  their  shameful  victories.      To  the  poor,  dark 

a  We  have  done  better  than  if,  with  the  proud  Span-  souls  round  about  us  we  teach  their  rights  AS  men. — 

iards,  we  had  gained  the  mines  of  Potosi.     We  may  Planter's  Speech,  1684. 

make  the  ambitious  heroes,  whom  the  world  admires. 


1  ,  ,r< 


THE  INDIAN  PROBLEM  STILL    UNSOLVED,  125 

the  Old  World  had  from  the  beginning  come  to  the  Natives  !  The  tomahawk 
never  would  have  grown  red  :  those  primitive  tribes  would  long  since  have 
become  vast  communities  of  illuminated,  Christian  men ;  and  we  should 
have  had  a  long  holiday  of  peace  with  our  brethren  of  the  forest.1 

Our  Treatment  of  the  Indians. — Some  few  plain  words  should  be  said  on  this 
subject,  and  I  may  as  well  say  them  here,  and  not  have  to  refer  to  the  matter  again. 
I  shall  go  no  further  into  the  sad  history  of  these  fading  races  than  is  required 
to  show  our  connection  with  the  aboriginal  possessors  of  the  soil.  Nor  is  it 
necessary ;  every  American  reader  becomes  familiar  with  the  subject ;  it  is 
taught  in  all  our  school-books,  and  is  found  throughout  our  colonial  history 
No  subject  has  received  more  attention.  From  the  early  settlement  of  the 
country,  the  Federal  Congress  has  dealt  with  no  problem  which  has  so  long 
and  hopelessly  baffled  a  solution,  as  the  Indian  question.  It  is  safe  to  state, 
as  a  general  proposition,  that  our  whole  treatment  of  the  Indian  tribes,  from 
the  beginning,  has  been  marked  by  the  greatest  generosity,  and  the  most  con- 
tinued injustice.  Nor  does  this  involve  any  contradiction.  Aside  from  the 
vast  sums  that  were  expended  by  the  original  colonies,  and  have  been  since  by 
philanthropic  and  good  men,  for  what  has  been  called  the  civilization  of  the 
Indians,  the  amount  which  has  been  appropriated  for  them  from  the  Federal 
treasury  has  amounted  to  several  hundred  millions  of  dollars.  More  money 
has  been  appropriated  under  the  pretext  of  civilizing  them,  than  has  been  ex- 
pended by  the  people  of  the  United  States  in  civilizing  all  the  rest  of  the 
world.  And  yet  we  have  been  always  at  war  with  them.  It  has  been  one 
continual  record  of  butchery  and  revenge  from  the  first  landing  of  the 
Spaniards  on  our  Southern  coast,  down  to  the  massacre  of  Gen.  Canby. 

I  esteem  nothing  as  sacred  in  the  exclusive  claim  of  the  savage  to  any 
portion  of  God's  green  world  or  free  waters.  The  earth  was  given  for  the  ser- 
vice of  the  human  family ;  and  any  exclusive  right,  by  conquest  or  discovery, 
to  the  absolute  control  of  any  part  of  it,  without  regard  to  the  well-being 
of  its  original  inhabitants,  is  founded  in  essential  injustice.  The  only  basis 
upon  which  such  claims  can  rest  with  original  races,  is  fair  treaty  and  the 
corresponding  obligations  of  humanity  and  good  neighborhood,  which  pro- 
ceed therefrom. 

There  is  no  more  justice  in  the  discoverer  entering  upon  the  territory  of 
an  unknown  people,  and  driving  them  out  like  wild  beasts,  or  exterminating 
them  by  the  vices  of  so-called  civilization,  than  there  is  in  the  conqueror  who 
invades  the  soil  of  a  civilized  nation,  and  appropriates  its  possessions  to  the 
conqueror's  use. 

True,  indeed,  fertile  tracts  of  the  earth  are  to  be  occupied  by  civilized 
men,  and  the  whole  globe  is  yet  to  be  turned  into  a  garden.     This  must  be 

1  I  have  elsewhere  treated  this  subject  as  fully  as  done  mischief  enough.      Carry  it  out  to  its  logical  con- 

my  space  would  allow.      The  American  conscience  has  elusion,  and  these  poor  children  of  Nature  could  look 

been  too  easily  lulled  into  security  by  the  impious  as-  forward  to  no  other  doom  than  extermination,  which  is 

lumption  that  the  Aborigines  of  this  country  are  incap-  not  a  fate  that  the  humanity  of  this  age  can  contemplate 

able  of  civilization.      This  demoralizing  doctrine  has  with  complacency. 


126  THE  NEMESIS  OF   THE  RED- MAN'S  CURSE. 

done,  too,  through  the  agency  of  discovery,  settlement  colonization,  agricul- 
ture, and  all  the  arts  of  civilization.  But  there  are  conditions  affixed  by  the 
Creator  by  which  this  process  must  be  regulated. 

There  is  no  more  mystery  in  the  gradual  disappearance  or  extinction  of 
the  Indians  of  this  continent,  or  the  aborigines  of  any  other  part  of  the  world, 
than  there  is  in  the  extinction  of  the  wild  beasts.  The  modern  doctrine,  that 
the  fittest  must  survive  in  the  great  struggle — that  the  weakest  must  go  under 
— that  the  strongest  must  prevail — has  so  warped  the  public  conscience,  that 
the  whole  country  has  resigned  itself  to  a  shameful  apathy  concerning  the 
fate  of  the  Indian,  and  hugged  to  itself  what  comfort  it  could  find  in  this  Dar- 
winian justification.  The  great  mass  of  the  American  people  have  looked  upon 
the  fading  away  of  the  Indian  races  with  the  same  indifference  with  which  the 
geologist  contemplates  the  extinction  of  the  Saurian  races.  But  the  principle 
is  nevertheless  true,  as  we  find  it  laid  down  in  the  eternal  code  of  justice  and 
divine  legislation,  that,  'Woe  unto  the  world  because  of  offences,  for  of- 
fences must  needs  come ;  but  woe  unto  the  man  through  whom  they  come.' 
All  through  our  history  we  find  frequent  and  striking  illustrations  of  the  truth 
that  might  does  not  make  right — which  is  the  code  of  barbarism,  and  not  of 
humanity.  The  Nemesis  of  the  red-man's  curse  still  pursues  the  pale-face. 
Scarcely  a  day  has  gone  by  in  our  frontier  annals  but  some  so-called  civilized 
man's  home  has  smoked  in  flames,  or  his  wife  or  children  been  brained  by  the 
tomahawk  of  Indian  vengeance. 

That  large  class  of  men  who  soothe  their  consciences  by  the  brazen  and 
blasphemous  assumption,  that  the  Indian  is  incapable  of  civilization,  find  all 
history  at  war  with  them.  In  fact,  we  search  in  vain  for  any  one  nation  ex- 
cept our  own,  that  has  not  had  to  climb  up  to  civilized  life  from  the  depths  of 
barbarism. 

Nineteen  hundred  years  ago  the  Roman  standard  first  floated  on  the 
shores  of  Britain.  Then  a  race  of  barbarians — our  ancestors — clothed  in  the 
skins  of  wild  beasts,  roamed  over  the  uncultivated  island.  The  tread  of  the 
Legions  was  then  heard  on  the  plains  of  Africa  and  Asia,  and  the  name  of 
Rome  was  written  on  the  front  of  the  world.  Two  thousand  years  have 
rolled  by,  and  Julius  Caesar,  and  all  the  Caesars,  the  Senate,  the  People,  and 
the  Empire  of  Rome,  have  passed  away  like  a  dream.  The  population  of 
the  Eternal  City  now  falls  short  of  that  of  Brooklyn,  while  that  island  of  bai  • 
barians  has  emulated  Rome  in  her  conquests,  and  not  only  planted  and  un- 
furled her  standard  in  the  three  quarters  of  the  globe  that  owned  the  Roman 
sway,  but  laid  her  all-grasping  hand  on  new  continents.  Possessing  the 
energy  and  valor  of  her  Saxon  and  Norman  ancestors,  she  has  remained 
unconquered  and  unbroken  amidst  the  changes  that  have  ended  the  history 
of  other  nations.  Like  her  own  island  that  sits  firm  and  tranquil  in  the 
ocean  that  rolls  round  it,  she  has  stood  amid  the  ages  of  man,  and  the  over- 
throw of  empires. 


LAW  OF   CIVILIZATION.  127 

If  the  policy  of  the  Romans  had  been  extermination  instead  of  civilization, 
where  would  the  descendants  of  the  ancient  Britons  have  been  to-day  ?  If 
from  the  beginning  the  same  policy  had  been  displayed  by  the  settlers  of  this 
continent,  which  was  carried  out  by  the  Romans  in  their  settlements  and 
conquests,  the  Indian  races  whom  we  found  here  in  their  primitive  state, 
— vastly  superior  in  intellect,  culture,  spiritual  conceptions  of  God  and  his 
appropriate  worship,  and  in  all  the  capabilities  for  progress  and  civilization, — 
would  long  ago  have  grown  into  a  great  civilized  people  by  themselves,  or  they 
would  at  once  have  been  recognized  as  citizens,  participating  with  our  fathers 
in  all  the  blessings  of  civic  life.  It  is  well  enough  to  talk  about  the  fittest 
being  the  survivor  when  we  come  to  the  inferior  orders  of  animate  creation ; 
but  this  talk  will  not  do  when  we  come  to  man,  made  in  the  image  of  God, 
destined  to  endless  life  ;  the  equal  brother  of  the  most  gifted  and  enlightened, 
and  as  fairly  entitled  as  he,  to  participate  in  the  great  fortunes  of  the  human 
race,  inheriting  from  a  common  Father  capacities  for  improvement  through 
endless  ages.  Here  Darwinianism  is  blasphemy,  if  indeed  that  illustrious 
savant  would  countenance  so  brutal  a  doctrine  or  so  gross  a  perversion  of  his 
system,  which  I  more  than  doubt. 

In  tracing  back  the  stream  of  civilization,  we  glance  for  a  moment  behind 
the  times  of  the  Caesars — beyond  the  founders  of  the  Roman  Empire.  They  had 
received  their  civilization  from  cultured  races.  Greece  herself,  who  became 
the  mother  of  refinement  and  the  teacher  of  all  the  ages,  was  but  the  child  of 
earlier  and  mightier  empires.  She  was  but  a  colony  that  went  off  from  the 
east ;  so,  too,  old  Egypt,  which  reached  so  high  a  point  in  culture,  was  but 
a  child  of  an  older  civilization  which  spread  westward  from  the  great  heart  of 
still  older  Asia. 

Thus  the  river  of  civilization  has  refreshed  instead  of  submerging  nations  ; 
and  this  abominable  doctrine  of  the  impossibility  of  civilizing  the  North  Amer- 
ican Indian  finds  no  comfort  or  sanction  in  the  records  of  mankind.  It  had 
no  place  in  the  theory  or  practice  of  the  first  settlers  of  New  England.  The 
Plymouth  colony  had  no  trouble  with  the  Indians.  For  a  long  period  they 
were  looked  upon  as  friends,  and  treated  as  neighbors ;  their  rights  were  re- 
spected :  they  were  civilized  to  a  considerable  extent.  Thousands  of  them 
were,  through  the  labors  of  Eliot,  Williams,  Edwards,  Brainard,  and  other  good 
and  great  men,  gathered  into  schools,  colleges  and  churches  :  while  experi- 
ence, not  only  with  individuals  but  with  whole  tribes,  feeble  as  the  efforts 
have  been,  have  demonstrated  the  capacity  of  the  Indian  races  for  equal  cul- 
ture and  elevation  with  the  men  of  any  other  race — always  excepting  the 
Caucasian — the  highest  form  which  humanity  has  yet  reached.  The  careful 
reader  of  the  efforts  that  were  made  by  the  Puritans  and  their  descendants 
to  make  Indians  civilized,  Christian  men,  will  find  among  them  the  most 
fascinating  and  beautiful  records  of  the  history  of  virtue  and  religion. 

Penn  Founds  his  Capital \  Jan.,  1683. — His  reasons  for  the  choice  ot  the 


128  POLITICAL  SYSTEM  OF   CIVILIZATION. 

beautiful  site  of  Philadelphia,  he  thus  gives  :  '  The  convenience  of  the  two 
rivers — Schuylkill  and  Delaware — the  solid  character  of  the  land  ;  pure  springs 
of  water,  and  salubrious  air,  make  it  a  situation  not  surpassed  by  one  among 
all  the  many  places  I  have  seen  in  the  world.'  '  Here,'  wrote  his  companions 
at  the  time,  '  we  may  worship  God  according  to  the  dictates  of  the  Divine 
Principle,  free  from  the  mouldy  errors  of  tradition ;  here  we  may  thrive,  in 
peace  and  retirement,  in  the  lap  of  unadulterated  nature  ;  here  we  may  im- 
prove an  innocent  course  of  life  on  a  virgin  elysian  soil.' 

Legislatioft  Begins. — Less  than  three  months  passed  after  he  had  chosen 
the  spot  and  obtained  its  title  from  the  Swedes  who  owned  it,  when  he  invited 
representatives  from  the  six  counties  into  which  his  dominions  were  divided, 
and  these  nine  representatives,  Swedes,  Dutch,  and  Quakers,  duly  elected  by 
the  free  inhabitants,  met  to  frame  a  charter  for  their  government  and  per- 
petual liberty.  He  had  indeed  drawn  up  a  plan  embracing  his  own  views ; 
but  when  he  laid  it  on  the  table  around  which  this  little  Parliament  was 
holding  its  councils  in  a  log  hut,  he  says  :  ■  You  may  amend,  alter,  or  add  : 
I  am  ready  to  settle  such  foundations  as  may  be  for  your  happiness.'  They 
did  establish  a  free  republican  government ;  so  free  that  throughout  his  own 
dominions  the  Quaker  King  could  not  appoint  a  justice  of  the  peace,  or  even 
a  constable ;  nor  could  the  Governor  perform  any  public  act  without  the 
consent  of  the  Council.  All  viceroys  and  governors  in  America  had  always 
and  were  then  deriving  a  revenue  from  exports  and  various  taxes.  These 
were  expected  and  offered  to  Penn :  but  he  declared  that  the  very  name  of 
tax-gatherer  should  be  unknown  in  his  province.  With  the  single  exception 
that  the  office  of  Proprietary  was  vested  in  him,  and  would  remain  hereditary, 
the  new  government  of  Pennsylvania  was  a  pure  Democracy.  William 
Penn's  work  was  done  ;  and  he  contemplated  it  with  deeper  gratitude  and 
joy  perhaps,  than  was  felt  by  those  who  had  considered  themselves  his  sub- 
jects, and  who  had  received,  as  they  declared,  more  liberty  than  they  expected. 
'  I  only  wanted,'  he  replied,  '  to  show  men  as  free  and  as  happy  as  they  can 
be.'  Long  after  he  had  returned  to  his  native  country,  where  his  heart  kept 
beating  just  as  warm,  and  in  the  very  spot  where  it  was  when  he  called  that  first 
Legislature  together  to  make  a  code  for  Pennsylvania,  he  writes  to  his  friends 
in  these  words  : — '  If  in  the  relation  between  us,  the  people  want  of  me  any- 
thing that  would  make  them  happier,  I  should  readily  grant  it.  I  left  them 
free  to  change  their  frame  of  government  when  and  as  they  liked.  I  never 
wanted  to  impose  my  will  upon  free  men.1 

In  the  changes  of  parties  in  England,  Penn  had  been  deprived  of  his  char- 
ter ;  but  it  was  restored  to  him  in  1694.  He  would  have  at  once  returned  to 
the  banks  of  the  Delaware,  but  he  was  now  a  poor  man.     That  portion  of 

1  It  may  seem  strange,   after  all  this,    that   Penn  lished   a   letter  from  James  Logan   to  Mrs.   Hannah 

should  ha*e  lived  and  died  a  slaveholder  ;   for  it  was  Penn,  written  'ye  nth,  3  mo.,  1721,'  in  which  are  these 

contrary  t  J  his  creed, — to  all  his  religious  and   political  unmistakable  words  :    '  The  Proprietor,  in  a  letter  left 

principles     The  fact  itself  was  denied  for  more  than  a  with  me  at  his  departure  hence   [death],   gave  all  las 

century  ;  nor  would   it  perhaps  have  been  commonly  negroes  their  freedom,'  etc. 
Mieved  at  all,  had  not  Bancroft  many  years  ago  pub- 


CLOSE   OF  PENN'S  NOBLE  CAREER.  129 

his  fortune  which  he  had  not  lost  in  England,  had  been  expended  upon  his 
colony,  which  he  always  treated  with  the  largest  magnanimity.  But  he  in- 
vested Markham  with  executive  power,  and  in  the  spring  of  1695  he  depu- 
tized him  to  visit  Pennsylvania.  The  following  year  Markham  met  the  legis- 
lature, and  they  enacted  such  laws  as  they  pleased,  with  his  full  concurrence. 
No  attempt  was  made  to  interfere  with  their  independence. 

In  the  close  of  November,  1699,  Penn  himself  once  more  landed  in 
Philadelphia.  He  was  received  with  the  utmost  kindness  and  respect,  and 
he  went  to  work  with  earnestness  to  advance  the  interests  of  his  people.  He 
made  an  effort  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  Negro  slaves,  and  strongly 
urged  the  enactment  of  a  law  securing  the  sanctity  of  their  marriage,  with 
guarantees  for  their  personal  safety.  He  failed  in  the  first,  for  in  no  part  of 
the  civilized  world  could  he  find  anybody  to  agree  with  him  that  the  institu- 
tion itself  was  not  just.  But  he  ameliorated  their  social  state,  and  they 
suffered  few  of  those  privations  which  were  attached  to  the  condition  of  slavery 
in  other  countries.  He  made  new  treaties  of  peace  with  the  Indian  tribes 
all  through  the  territory  of  Pennsylvania,  and  away  to  the  north,  as  far  as 
Oswego.  The  wide  range  of  the  beneficent  measures  he  proposed  was 
warmly  adopted  by  the  colonists.  There  was  toleration,  protection,  and 
peace;  and  his  great  work  seemed  to  be  done.  It  had  been  his  intention, 
when  he  returned,  to  make  his  permanent  home  in  America,  to  remove  his 
family  to  their  final  settlement,  and  lay  his  bones  on  the  banks  of  the  Dela- 
ware. In  the  exercise  of  his  legal  power  he  had  divested  himself  of  every 
attribute  of  sovereignty  ;  but  it  still  left  him  the  owner  of  all  unappropriated 
lands  in  the  colony.  Having  thus  stripped  himself  of  all  political  power,  he 
would  have  alienated  most  of  his  vast  estate  also,  had  it  not  been  necessary 
for  him  to  retain  his  feudal  rights,  in  order  to  hold  the  franchises  of  his  charter, 
which  otherwise  would  have  lapsed  to  the  throne,  and  thus  involved  the  loss 
of  the  liberties  of  the  colony.  But  having  the  good  of  the  colony  at  heart, 
he  remained  its  feudal  sovereign,  although  the  settlers  everywhere  found  him 
ready  to  acquiesce  in  every  demand  or  request  that  they  made.  He  had 
founded  a  democracy,  and  he  interposed  no  restrictions  to  the  possession  of 
the  soil.  Nothing  was  left  to  be  done  ;  and  bidding  his  friends  and  the  colon 
ists  an  affectionate  farewell,  he  sailed  for  the  last  time  for  England.  The 
great  principles  of  British  liberty  now  being  fully  consolidated  under  the 
peaceful  reign  of  William  and  the  ascendency  of  the  Whig  party,  Penn's  in- 
fluence was  so  great,  and  the  respect  entertained  for  him  was  so  general,  that 
the  statesmen  and  leading  men  of  England  were  ready  to  concur  in  any  pro- 
position he  made  concerning  the  well-being  of  his  colony  ;  and  as  long  as  he 
lived,  this  influence  was  put  forth  for  their  good. 

Such  had  been  the  beginnings  of  government  and  Christian  civilization 
in  Pennsylvania ;  and  such  they  have  been  preserved.     His  farewell  to  his 
colonists  is  touching  and  beautiful : — ■  My  love  and  my  life  are    to   you, 
o 


13°  CHEERFUL    CLOSE   OF  PENN'S  LIFE. 

and  with  you,  and  no  water  can  quench  it,  nor  distance  bring  it  tc  an  end. 
1  have  been  with  you,  cared  over  you,  and  served  you,  with  unfeigned 
love  ;  and  you  are  beloved  of  me  and  dear  to  me,  beyond  utterance.  I  bless 
you  in  the  name  and  power  of  the  Lord ;  and  may  God  bless  you  with  his 
righteousness,  peace  and  plenty,  all  the  land  over.  You  are  come  to  a  quiet 
land,  and  liberty  and  authority  are  in  your  hands.  Rule  for  Him  under  whom1 
the  princes  of  this  world  will  one  day  esteem  it  their  honor  to  govern  in  His 
place.  *  *  *  And  thou,  Philadelphia,  the  virgin  settlement  of  this  prov- 
ince ;  my  soul  prays  to  God  for  thee  ;  that  thou  mayest  stand  in  the  day  of 
trial ;  and  that  thy  children  be  blessed.  *  *  *  Dear  friends,  my  love 
salutes  you  all.'  From  that  hour  the  image  of  the  grand  old  Hall  of  Inde- 
pendence must  have  risen  on  the  vision  of  the  guardian  prophet  who  watched 
over  the  City  of  Brotherly  Love,  and  he  must  have  known  that  it  was  to  be 
the  Mecca  of  liberty  forever. 

I  may  leave  the  history  of  Pennsylvania  for  the  next  hundred  years  untold. 
With  his  characteristic  and  admirable  citations  of  original  authorities,  Bancroft 
illustrates  it: — 'In  August,  1683,  Philadelphia  consisted  of  three  or  four 
little  cottages  ;  the  conies  were  yet  undisturbed  in  their  hereditary  burrows ; 
the  deer  fearlessly  bounded  past  blazed  trees,  unconscious  of  foreboded  streets  ; 
the  stranger  that  wandered  from  the  river  bank  was  lost  in  the  thickets  of  in 
terminable  forests  ;  and  two  years  afterwards,  the  place  contained  about  six 
hundred  houses,  and  the  school-house  and  the  printing-press  had  begun  their 
work.  In  three  years  from  its  foundation,  Philadelphia  gained  more  than  New 
York  had  done  in  half  a  century.  This  was  the  happiest  season  in  the  public 
life  of  William  Penn.  I  must  without  vanity  say — such  was  his  honest  exulta- 
tion— I  have  led  the  greatest  colony  into  America  that  ever  any  man  did, 
upon  private  credit ;  and  the  most  prosperous  beginnings  that  ever  were  in  it 
.are  to  be  found  among  us.  And  after  he  reached  England,  he  assured  the 
.eager  inquirers  that  things  went  on  sweetly  with  Friends  in  Pennsylvania  ; 
that  they  increased  finely  in  outward  things,  and  in  wisdom.  On  his  death- 
bed, the  venerable  apostle  of  equality  was  lifted  above  the  fear  of  dying,  and 
esteeming  the  change  hardly  deserving  of  mention,  his  thoughts  turned  to  the 
New  World.  Pennsylvania,  and  Delaware,  and  West  New  Jersey,  and  now 
Rhode  Island,  and  in  some  measure  North  Carolina,  were  Quaker  States.  As 
his  spirit,  awakening  from  its  converse  with  shadows,  escaped  from  the  exile  of 
fallen  .humanity,  nearly  his  last  words  were — "  Mind  poor  Friends  in  America, 
His  works  praise  him.  •  Neither  time  nor  place  can  dissolve  fellowship  with  his 
spirit."'— Bancroft,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  391,  392,  393,  402. 

The  Colony  of  Virginia. — We  left  the  colony  of  Virginia  growing  strong 
in  the  year  of  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims.  Under  the  wise  administration  of 
Yeardley  and  Sandys,  the  first  free  State  on  American  soil  seemed  to  be 
firmly  established.  We  now  return  to  the  banks  of  the  James  river  to  witness 
a  scene  of  desolation. 


THE   GREAT  INDIAN  MASSACRE  IN   VIRGINIA.  131 

The  Great  Indian  Massacre,  March  22,  1622. — Powhatan  had  now  been 
dead  four  years,  and  the  ashes  of  the  red-man's  friendship  slept  in  the  grave 
of  the  honored  chief.  A  younger  brother,  who  succeeded  to  his  rank  and 
possessions,  had  never  looked  complacently  upon  the  encroachments  Of  the 
pale-faces,  and  he  stealthily  organized  a  plot  for  their  complete  extermination. 
The  natives  within  sixty  miles  of  Jamestown  hardly  exceeded  six  thousand, 
and  they  numbered  only  twenty-four  hundred  warriors.  They  lived  chiefly 
in  scattered  villages  of  wigwams  clustered  around  the  skirts  of  the  white  set- 
tlements ;  nor  till  nearly  at  the  last  moment  had  a  suspicion  of  their  deadly 
purpose  been  breathed  into  the  ear  of  one  of  the  four  thousand  colonists 
whose  homes  dotted  the  banks  of  the  James  for  a  hundred  and  forty  miles, 
and  stretched  far  away  towards  the  Potomac.  The  day  and  the  hour  fixed  on 
had  come;  and  as  the  sun  of  the  2 2d  of  March  reached  the  meridian,  the 
wild  yell  of  the  savages  rang  out  on  the  still  air,  and  the  tomahawk  fell  upon 
the  helpless  and  unsuspecting  dwellers  at  the  same  instant  in  every  settlement 
of  the  colony  of  Virginia.  The  bolt  and  the  flash  came  together,  and  there 
was  no  mercy.  Mothers  and  babes  were  cleft  down  by  the  same  blow.  Mis- 
sionaries of  peace,  and  benefactors  who  had  shown  kindness,  were  murdered 
alike  at  their  hearth-stones.  Death  itself  could  not  satiate  their  ferocious 
vengeance.  They  sprang  upon  the  still  bleeding  corpses,  and  tore  them  into 
fragments  like  wild  beasts.  Within  that  fatal' hour  three  hundred  and  forty- 
seven  Anglo-Saxons  lay  mangled  and  dead.  But  for  the  noble  though  tardy 
act  of  a  converted  Indian,  who  stole  into  Jamestown  under  cover  of  the  pre- 
vious night,  and  revealed  the  plot  to  a  settler  whom  he  wished  to  save,  the 
ruin  would  have  been  complete.  Heaven  averted  so  awful  a  calamity.  The 
conflict  and  obscurity  of  the  various  records  leave  the  exact  number  of  the 
victims  undetermined.  We  only  know  that  of  the  four  thousand  on  the  morn- 
ing of  the  massacre,  the  entire  colony,  one  year  later,  counted  only  twenty- 
five  hundred ! 

This  atrocious  deed  sealed  the  doom  of  the  native  races  of  Virginia. 
They  could  no  longer  live  among  the  pale-faces.  They  fled  from  the  ashes 
of  their  wigwams  to  the  depths  of  the  forests.  The  bloody  story  was  told  in 
London,  and  the  heart  of  all  England  went  out  to  their  stricken  friends  in 
Virginia.  Help  reached  them  as  quick  as  relief  ships  could  cross  the  ocean : 
men,  money,  provisions,  and  implements  of  death  were  the  freight.  We  are 
prepared  for  the  result  which  history  always  records  of  the  indomitable  Anglo- 
Saxon — the  blood  of  the  victims,  says  StitK,  became  the  nurture  of  the  planta- 
tion. Missionary  zeal  had  suddenly  cooled,  and  for  a  considerable  time  we 
find  no  account  of  Rolf-Pocahontas  nuptials  in  our  little  log  temple  at  James- 
town.    But  we  do  hear  of  two  other  facts  that  occurred  about  this  time  : — 

I.  The  Bishop  of  London  collected  and  paid  over  a  thousand  pounds  to 
begin  the  foundation  of  a  University  in  Virginia: 

II.  Cotton  seeds  began  to  be  planted,  and  they  came  up  plentifully. 

We  need  have  no  more  solicitude  for  Virginia.  She  had  brave  men  and 
devoted  women,  which  gave  her  a  commonwealth  too  well  founded  ever  to  be 


132  PROGRESS   OF   THE   CAROLINAS. 

overthrown — tobacco,  for  export,  which  gave  her  commerce  and  wealth — In 
dian  corn,  and  sweet-potatoes,  which  gave  her  bread — negro  slavery,  which 
secured  an  unfailing  supply  of  labor — a  fertile  soil  and  a  genial  climate — a 
steady  flow  of  emigration — the  seeds  of  a  university — and,  above  all,  citizens 
to  sustain  the  structure  of  a  Christian  civilization.  When  we  again  return  to 
Virginia  we  shall  find  her  grown  into  a  splendid  commonwealth,  and  giving 
birth  to  a  race  of  statesmen  who,  when  the  hour  came,  were  to  light  the  fires 
of  National  Independence. 

The  Carolinas. — We  are  now  passing  to  the  blushing  groves  of  the  mag- 
nolia and  palmetto  regions  of  the  purple  South.  The  first  child  of  the  Mother 
of  States  was  North  Carolina.  From  the  overflowing  population  of  Virginia 
were  established  the  first  settlements  on  Albemarle  Sound.  Grants  were 
made  to  Virginians  by  Sir  William  Berkeley,  as  rewards  for  taking  settlers  to 
the  new  region.  He  had  himself  become  a  joint  proprietary  of  Carolina,  in 
a  royal  charter  already  given.  New-comers  were  fast  flocking  in  from  discon- 
tented parties  in  Virginia,  and  Puritans  of  the  north,  grown  restive  under 
New  England  restraints.  William  Drummond,  a  native  of  Scotland,  of  Puri- 
tan tendencies,  but  an  enthusiast  for  popular  liberty,  was  appointed  Governor 
of  North  Carolina.  Genial  in  disposition,  benevolent  of  heart,  and  large  in 
his  views  of  liberty,  he  imposed  no  restraints  on  conscience,  and  extended  all 
possible  encouragement  to  emigrants  from  any  part  of  the  world.  A  colony 
of  planters  came  from  Barbadoes  and  settled  on  a  tract  tlirrtptwo  miles 
square,  which  they  purchased  from  the  Indians  on  Cape  Fear  river.  The 
great  Earl  of  Shaftesbury ' — one  of  the  most  brilliant  and  influential  states- 
men, scholars,  and  philosophers  of  his  time — had,  with  Clarendon  and  other 
men  of  rank  and  wealth,  obtained  a  charter  from  Charles  II.,  June  13,  1665, 
covering  a  territory  of  vast  extent,  seven  and  one-half  degrees  from  the 
southern  line  of  Virginia,  south,  and  forty  degrees  west,  comprising  the  two 
Carolinas,  Alabama,  Georgia,  Tennessee,  Mississippi,  Louisiana,  Arkansas, 
and  most  of  Florida,  Missouri,  Texas,  and  Mexico.  It  was  a  magnificent 
grant,  and  vast  results  came  from  it,  although  it  was  too  unwieldy  to  be  man- 
aged by  any  men  living  in  those  times.  But  the  large  and  liberal  spirit  of 
Shaftesbury  breathed  through  every  line .  of  the  charter.  Religious  freedom 
was  secured  as  completely  as  in  the  charter  of  Roger  Williams. 

Locke* s  Constitution. — This  great  metaphysician  was  the  chosen  friend  of 
Shaftesbury,  and  together  they  elaborated  the  famous  Constitution  for  the  new 
empire,  which,  at  the  time,  was  supposed  to  be  the  maximum  of  all  political 
wisdom.  It  was  a  splendid  aristocratic  structure,  but  as  purely  an  ideal 
dream  as  Plato  indulged  in  for  his  form  of  a  republic.     There  could  be  no 

1  Shaftesbury  was  a:  this  time  in  the  full  maturity  of  had  from  boyhood  obtained  the  mastery  over  the  loye 

his  genius ;  celebrated  for  eloquence,  philosophic  ge-  of  indulgence  and  luxury.     Connected  with  the  great 

nius,  and  sagacity  ;    h  gh  in  power,  and  of  aspiring  landed  aristocracy  of  England,  cradled  in  politics,  and 

ambition.     Born  to  guat  hereditaiy  wealth,  the  pupil  chosen  a  member  of  Parliament  at  the  age  of  nineteen, 

of  Prideaux  had  given  his  early  years  to  the  assiduous  his  long  public  career  was  checkered  by  the  greatest 

pursuit  of  knowledge  ;  the  intellectual  part  of  his  nature  varieties  of  success. — Bancroft,  vol.  ii.,  p.  139. 


QUAKER  AND  HUGUENOT  SETTLEMENTS.  133 

permanent  legislative  union  between  hereditary  wealth  and  political  pcwer  in 
this  country,  and  of  course  these  constitutions  never  took  effect.  Bancroft 
well  says,  on  this  point:  'But  the  formation  of  political  institutions  in  the 
United  States  was  not  effected  by  giant  minds,  or  nobles  after  the  flesh ; ' 
and,  borrowing  the  maxim  which  Lord  Bacon  lays  down  in  that  treasure-house 
of  imperishable  wisdom,  the  Novum  Organum,  the  American  historian  adds : 
'American  history  knows  but  one  avenue  to  success  in  American  legislation 
— freedom  from  ancient  prejudice.  The  truly  great  law-givers  in  our  colo- 
nies first  became  as  little  children.* 

The  Quakers  and  Huguenots  in  the  Carolinas. — With  a  spirit  not  un- 
worthy of  a  Christian  apostle,  George  Fox,  who  was  now  visiting  his  disci- 
ples in  all  their  settlements  scattered  through  the  colonies,  penetrated  the 
Carolinas  in  his  missionary  travels.  Some  of  the  Friends  had  early  chosen 
their  homes  in  those  districts,  attracted  by  a  spirit  of  toleration  as  grateful  to 
the  Quaker  character  as  the  corresponding  blandness  of  the  climate  itself. 
The  Quaker  apostle  found  himself  the  only  preacher  of  the  Gospel  in  the 
whole  region,  and  he  luxuriated  in  the  perfect  freedom  with  which  he  could  do 
his  divine  Master's  work  in  the  most  strange  medley  which  constituted  the 
society  there  growing  up.  Insensible  to  fatigue,  heedless  of  danger  from 
malaria,  savages,  or  wild  beasts,  he  tells  us  how  he  crossed  the  great  bogs  of 
the  Dismal  Swamp,  •  laying  abroad  anights  in  the  woods  by  a  fire,'  till  he 
reached  some  cabin,  and  brought  to  the  settler  and  his  family  the  winning 
message  of  love  from  the  Prince  of  Peace.  He  tells  us  how  the  settlers 
lived,  '  lonely  in  their  woods,  with  no  sentinel  on  guard  but  the  watch-dog.' 
We  next  find  the  apostle  a  guest  of  the  Governor,  '  who,  with  his  wife,  receive 
him  lovingly.'  In  parting  from  this  magistrate,  he  had  for  a  companion  in 
travelling  towards  the  south,  the  Governor  of  South  Carolina,  a  superior  man, 
who  showed  him  the  way  through  the  luxuriant  region,  to  his  own  plantation, 
where  another  warm  greeting  was  extended;  for,  as  the  Governor's  boat  got 
aground,  the  wife  of  the  Secretary  of  State  shot  out  in  her  light  canoe  and 
took  the  preacher  to  her  home.  And  so  he  completed  his  tour  j  having,  as 
he  said,  found  the  people  '  generally  tender  and  open,  and  a  little  entrance 
for  the  Truth.'  Entrance,  indeed  ! — so  broad  that  the  principles  of  a  pure 
Gospel  were  introduced,  which  left  little  hope  for  the  constitutions  of  Locke 
and  Shaftesbury ;  for  it  was  not  the  metaphysician,  but  the  Nazarene,  who 
was  to  shape  the  fortunes  of  those  Carolina  settlers  and  their  distant  pos- 
terity. 

But  a  vigorous  effort  was  made  by  Shaftesbury  and  his  fellow-corporators, 
to  colonize  and  rule  the  Carolinas.  Ships  were  sent  out,  carrying  superior 
classes  of  emigrants, — scholars,  philosophers,  Puritans,  Quakers — but  all  free 
thinkers,  divided  on  all  points  except  the  two  great  ones, — a  new  home  in 
Nature's  own  paradise,  and  freedom  of  conscience.  They  embraced  the 
noblest  elements  that  could  have  been  invoked  to  form  a  great  State.  The 
country  was  moreover  freer  to  them  than  it  had  been  to  the  other  colonists, 


134      EFFECTS  OF  REVOCATION  OF  EDICT  OF  NANTES. 

for  wasting  epidemics  had  long  before  swept  the  native  population  away  ale  ng 
the  shore  of  the  Atlantic  and  the  banks  of  the  great  rivers ;  and  murderous 
wars  between  the  tribes  had  still  further  reduced  their  numbers.  Sites  for 
towns  were  chosen  with  little  reference  to  commerce,  and  even  the  spot 
between  the  two  rivers,  selected  by  Shaftesbury  himself,  and  called  after  him, 
proved  not  so  attractive  nor  useful  as  the  neck  of  land  known  as  Oyster 
Point,  where  a  village  soon  sprang  up  called  Charleston,  after  the  king  of 
England.1  The  history  of  that  little  hamlet  which  afterwards  was  to  grow 
into  the  opulent  and  beautiful  city  destined  to  so  checkered,  and  sometimes  so 
mournful,  but  always  heroic  and  brilliant  a  life,  is  worthy  of  a  larger  record 
than  I  can  find  space  for.  But  her  record  is  in  the  memory  and  in  the  litera- 
ture of  the  last  two  centuries  ;  and  may  it  live  in  all  that  are  to  come. 

Glowing  accounts  of  this  beautiful  region  captivated  the  fancies  of  some 
of  the  noblest  and  most  gifted  of  the  English  people.  They  were  lured  from 
all  ranks.  Furgueson  brought  a  colony  from  Ireland.  Joseph  Blake,  the 
brother  of  the  great  Admiral,  took  a  company  of  persecuted  dissenters  from 
Somersetshire,  and  lavished  upon  their  establishment  the  wealth  he  had  in- 
herited from  the  Spanish  plunder  of  his  gallant  brother,  as  a  part  of  the  reward 
of  his  immortal  victories. 

Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  Oct.  22,  1685. — The  compensations 
which  Providence,  history,  and  men  work  out,  are  among  the  most  mysterious, 
and  when  solved,  the  most  exquisitely  beautiful  riddles  that  puzzle  the  brains 
of  angels  or  mortals.  My  readers  will  not  have  forgotten  how  the  noble  Co- 
ligny,  a  century  before,  had  been  allowed  by  Francis  to  found  asylums  for 
the  hunted  Huguenots  on  the  Carolina  and  Florida  coasts ;  nor  how  they  had 
been  laid  waste  by  the  cruelty  of  the  remorseless  Melendez.  The  actors  of 
those  times  had  all  passed  away.  Francis,  Coligny,  Melendez,  the  slaughtered 
Huguenots  were  all  forgotten,  or  lived  only  on  the  pages  of  history.  But 
ideas  never  die  :  and  from  a  higher  sphere  the  exalted  spirit  of  the  protector 
of  the  Huguenots  now  saw  his  darling  scheme  carried  to  consummation.  I 
have  never  heard  any  Carolinian  express  his  gratitude  to  Madame  de  Main- 
tenon,  the  fascinating  mistress  of  Louis  XIV.  ;  and  yet  the  Carolinians  are 
still  in  her  debt.  But  for  that  mysterious  supremacy  she  gained  over  the 
mind  of  the  Grand  Monarque,  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  never 
would  have  been  proclaimed,  and  the  ascended  Coligny  never  would  have 
seen  the  grandchildren  of  his  beloved  Huguenots  finally  established  in  their 
western  homes.* 

1  On    the  spot  where  opulence    now    crowds    the  creased  ;  and  to  its   influence  is  in  some  degree  to  be 

wharfs  of  the  most  prosperous  mart  on  our  southern  attributed  the   love  of  letters,  and  that  desire  of  insti- 

seaboard,  among  ancient  groves  that  swept   down  to  tutions  for  education,  for  which  South   Carolina  was 

:he  rivers'  banks,   and  were  covered  with  the  yellow  afterwards  distinguished. — Bancroft,  vol.  ii.,  p.  170. 
lasmine,  which  burdened    the  vernal  zephyrs  with  its  a  When   Louis   XIV.  approached   the  borders  of 

perfumes,  the  cabins  of  graziers  began  the  city.    Long  age,  he   was  troubled  by  remorse  ;    the  weakness  of 

afterwapds,  the  splendid    vegetation   which    environs  superstition  succeeded  to  the  weakness  of  indulgence  ; 

Charleston,   e:tpecially  the  pine,   and   cedar,   and  cy-  and  the  flatteries  of  bigots,  artfully  employed  for  their 

Dress  trees  along   the   broad  road  which  is  now  Meet-  own  selfish  purposes,  led  the  vanity  of  the  monarch  to 

jig    street,    delighted    the  observer  by  its  perpetual  seek  in  making  proselytes  to  the  Church,  a  new  method 

verdure.     The  settlement,   though  for   some  years  it  of  gaining  glory,  and  an  atonement  for  the  voluptuous 

struggled  against   an  unhealthy  climate,  steadily  in-  profligacy  of  his  life.   Louis  was  not  naturally  cruel,  bit 


EMIGRATION  OF   THE  HUGUENOTS   TO  AMERICA.        13$ 

Emigration  of  the  Huguenots  to  America. — How  much  France  lost,  and 
the  rest  of  Europe,  but  above  all  America  gained,  by  the  Revocation  of  the 
Edict  of  Nantes,  history  has  but  partially  disclosed ;  for  it  could  not  fully.  Many 
Huguenots  came  to  New  England,  hungry,  and  naked :  they  were  clothed  and 
fed.  Others  were  kindly  received  at  New  York.  But  those  of  them  who  had 
tied  from  Languedoc  on  the  Mediterranean,  were  more  attracted  to  the  balmy 
regions  of  the  south.  It  was  not,  however,  from  that  province  of  France  alone 
that  they  came  to  Carolina,  but  from  the  old  bombarded  cities  of  Rochelle 
and  Bordeaux,  and  the  far-off  enchanting  valley  of  the  Tours ;  men  who,  as 
Bancroft  so  truthfully  says,  had  the  virtues  of  the  English  Puritans,  without 
their  bigotry ;  attracted  to  the  land  whither  the  tolerant  benevolence  of 
Shaftesbury  had  invited  the  believer  of  every  creed.  From  a  country  that  had 
suffered  its  king  in  wanton  bigotry, — rising  from  the  embrace  of  the  Delilah 
of  France — •  to  drive  half  a  million  of  its  best  citizens  into  exile,  they  came 
to  the  land  which  was  the  hospitable  refuge  of  the  oppressed  ;  where  supersti- 
tion and  fanaticism,  infidelity  and  faith,  cold  speculation  and  animated  zeal, 
were  alike  admitted  without  question,  and  where  the  fires  of  religious  perse- 
cution were  never  to  be  kindled.  There  they  obtained  an  assigment  of  lands, 
and  soon  had  tenements  ;  there  they  might  safely  make  the  woods  the  scene 
of  their  devotions,  and  join  the  simple  incense  of  their  psalms  to  the  melodies 
of  the  winds  among  the  ancient  groves.  Their  church  was  in  Charleston ; 
and  thither,  on  every  Lord's  Day,  gathering  from  their  plantations  upon  the 
banks  of  the  Cooper,  and  taking  advantage  of  the  ebb  and  flow  of  the  tide, 
they  might  all  regularly  be  seen,  the  parents  with  their  children,  whom  no 
bigot  could  now  wrest  from  them,  making  their  way  in  light  skiffs,  through 
scenes  so  tranquil  that  silence  was  broken  only  by  the  rippling  of  oars,  and 
the  hum  of  the  flourishing  village  at  the  confluence  of  the  rivers.'1 

We  have  thus  glanced  at  the  settlement  of  the  Carolinas.  We  may  safely 
leave  them  in  their  garden  homes,  all  under  their  own  vines  and  fig-trees, 
having  for  a  long  time  none  to  molest  them  or  make  them  afraid. 

Georgia,  1733. — The  youngest  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies  was  founded  one 
year  after  the  birth  of  Washington.     The  Spaniards  claimed  the  territory  as  a 

was  an  easy  dupe  of  those  in  whom  he  most  confided —  conciled  to  the  Church  ;  yet  not  by  methods  of  violence, 

of  priests  and  of  a  woman.    The  daughter  of  anadven*  Creeds  were  to  melt  away  in  the  sunshine  of  favor,  and 

turer — for  nearly  ten  years  of  childhood  a  resident  in  proselytes  to  be  won  by  appeals  to  interest — Bancroft, 

the  West  Indies,  educated  a  Calvinist,  but  early  con-  vol.  ii.,  pp.  175-6. 

verted  to  the  Roman  faith, — Madame  de  Maintenon,  1  The  United  States  are  full  of  monuments  of  the 
had,  in  the  house  of  a  burlesque  poet,  learned  the  art  emigrations  from  France.  When  the  struggle  for  inde- 
of  conversation,  and  in  the  intimate  society  of  Ninon  de  pendence  arrived,  the  son  of  Judith  Manigault  intrusted 
l'Enclos,  had  studied  the  mysteries  of  tha  passions,  the  vast  fortune  he  had  acquired  to  the  service  of  the 
Of  a  clear  and  penetrating  mind,  of  a  calculating  judg-  country  that  had  adopted  his  mother;  the  hall  in 
ment,  which  her  calm  imagination  could  not  lead  Boston,  where  the  eloquence  of  New  England  rocked 
astray,  she  never  forgot  her  self-possession  in  a  gener-  the  infant  spirit  of  independence,  was  the  gift  of  the 
ous  transport,  and  was  never  mastered  even  by  the  son  of  a  Huguenot ;  when  the  treaty  of  Paris  for  the 
passions  she  sought  to  gratify.  Already  advanced  in  independence  of  our  country  was  framing,  the  grand- 
life  when  she  began  to  attract  the  attention  of  the  king,  son  of  a  Huguenot,  acquainted  from  childhood  with 
whose  character  she  profoundly  understood,  she  sought  the  wrongs  of  his  ancestors,  would  not  allow  his  jealous- 
to  inthrall  his  mind  by  the  influences  of  religion  ;  and  ies  of  France  to  be  lulled,  and  exerted  a  powerful  in- 
becoming  herself  devout,  or  feigning  to  be  so,  always  fluence  in  stretching  the  boundary  of  the  States  to  the 
nodest  and  discreet,  she  knew  how  to  awaken  in  him  Mississippi.  On  the  north-eastern  frontier  State  the 
compunctions  which  she  alone  could  tranquillize,  and  name  of  the  oldest  college  bears  witness  to  the  wise 
subjected  his  mind  to  her  sway  by  substituting  the  sen-  liberality  of  the  Huguenots.  The  children  of  the  Cal- 
timent  of  devotion  for  the  passion  of  love.  The  con-  vinists  of  France  have  reason  to  respect  the  memory 
version  of  the  Huguenots  was  to  excuse  the  sins  of  his  of  their  ancestors. — Bancroft,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  183-3. 
earlier  years.     They,  like  herself,  were  to  become  re- 


136  GENERAL    OGLETHORPE  SETTLES   GEORGIA. 

portion  of  Florida,  and  the  cloud  of  war  hung  along  the  settlements—  the 
Indian  tribes  having  been  influenced  to  make  common  cause  with  the 
Spaniards.  The  origin  of  this  colony  rose  in  one  of  the  abuses  of  oppressive 
government  in  Europe,  and  under  circumstances  so  peculiar  they  demand  our 
notice.  Imprisonment  for  debt  was  so  generally  enforced,  that  many  thou- 
sands of  good  people  in  England  were  dragging  the  chain  of  prison  life, 
beyond  the  hope  of  relief.  Not  a  prison  but  what  swarmed  with  them.  The 
educated  and  the  ignorant,  the  refined  and  the  brutal,  the  pure  and  the  infa- 
mous, were  all  herded  together.  At  last  a  brave  and  benevolent  man  came 
to  their  relief. 

Gen.  James  Edward  Oglethorpe. — This  humane  gentleman,  whose  wealth 
and  rank,  united  to  his  rare  abilities  as  a  statesman,  had  already  undertaken 
in  Parliament  the  cause  of  this  numerous  and  neglected  class,  enforcing  it 
with  such  eloquence  that  a  committee  of  inquiry  was  appointed,  of  which  he 
was  made  chairman.  His  report  embraced  a  plan  of  practical  relief.  A 
thorough  investigation  was  to  be  made,  and  the  prison  doors  of  England 
opened  to  every  virtuous  man  who  would  consent  to  emigrate  under  the  gov- 
ernment of  a  colony  to  be  founded  of  that  class.  The  plan  met  with  the 
approval  of  Parliament  and  the  sanction  of  George  II.,  then  on  the  throne. 
On  the  9th  of  June,  1732,  a  royal  charter  for  twenty-one  years  was  granted  to 
a  corporation,  'in  trust  for  the  poor,'  to  establish  a  colony  within  the  disputed 
territory,  south  of  the  Savannah,  to  be  called  Georgia,  in  honor  of  the  king. 
A  general  subscription  took  place  among  the  benevolent  and  enlightened 
classes,  and  two  years  after  the  signing  of  the  charter,  Parliament  itself  appro- 
priated $180,000  for  the  purpose.  Gen.  Oglethorpe  was  so  earnest  and  prac- 
tical in  his  philanthropy,  that  he  headed  the  movement,  and  in  November  of  • 
the  same  year  he  sailed  for  Georgia  with  a  hundred  and  twenty  emigrants. 

Savannah  Founded,  Feb.  12,  1733. — Touching  at  Charleston,  after  a  pas- 
sage of  only  fifty-seven  days,  and  afterwards  at  Port  Royal,  where  he  landed 
most  of  his  emigrants,  he  proceeded  up  the  Savannah  river  as  far  as  Yama- 
craw  Bluff,  and  chose  the  site  for  the  foundation  of  a  city,  which  was  to  be- 
come the  capital  of  his  State.  From  the  commencement  of  settlements  in 
North  America,  no  one  had  started  under  auspices  so  fair.  The  equipment 
was  complete ;  the  management  was  under  the  control  of  a  great  man,  loyal 
to  his  king,  large  in  his  liberality — not  of  purse  only,  but  of  soul — sagacious 
in  business,  and  illuminated  in  political  judgment.  The  work  was  begun  at 
once  ;  the  town  was  laid  out  with  regularity  in  broad  streets ;  public  squares 
were  reserved ;  and  the  houses,  all  of  the  same  model,  were  twenty-four  by 
sixteen  feet.  The  work  went  on  without  interruption  during  the  winter,  and 
early  in  the  spring  crops  were  put  in.  Oglethorpe  had  no  sooner  pitched  his 
tent  on  the  bank  of  the  Savannah,  than  he  entered  into  friendly  relations  with 
the  sachems  of  the  Lower  Creek  confederacy  for  a  regular  purchase  of  land. 
We  have  a  most  interesting  description  of  the  reception  of  To-mo-chi-chi  by 


"YISTT  or    OGLETHORPE   TO    THE    UiailLA>-D    COLOXT. 


RESUME  OF   COLONIAL  FOUNDATIONS.  13 7 

Governor  Oglethorpe  in  his  tent,  where  it  stood  for  a  whole  year  as  his 
head-quarters  under  the  shadow  of  four  lofty  pines.  On  the  first  reception 
of  this  aged  and  venerable  chief,  he  presented  to  the  governor  the  skin  of 
a  huge  buffalo,  skilfully  ornamented  with  the  figure  of  an  eagle,  bearing  his 
own  beak,  claws,  and  feathers,  and  through  an  interpreter  addressed  the  fol- 
lowing words  :  '  I  give  you  buffalo  skin  ;  inside,  eagle  head  and  feathers.  Take 
it.  Eagle,  speed;  buffalo,  strength.  English,  swift,  like  eagle;  strong,  like 
buffalo.  Eagle  fly  over  big  seas ;  buffalo  hard  fight.  Eagle  feathers  soft : 
that  is,  love.  Buffalo  skin  warm :  that  is,  take  care  of  u.s.  English  protect 
and  love  our  little  people.'  ' 

And  thus  was  founded  the  Commonwealth  of  Georgia  and  its  Capital 
on  the  Yamacraw  bluff,  where  now  stands  the  beautiful  city  of  Savannah.  If 
constitution  afforded  the  fullest  protection  to  all  its  people,  and  the  fair  struc 
ture  of  a  civilized  Christian  State  sprang  into  being  in  an  unbroken  wilder- 
ness. 

Order  of  Colonial  Foundations. — And  thus  we  give  the  resumS  of  the 
order  in  which  the  settlements  were  made,  whose  foundations  we  have  so 
briefly  surveyed.  'Twelve  years — 1607  to  1619' — says  Lossing,  'were 
spent  by  English  adventurers  in  efforts  to  plant  a  permanent  settlement 
in  Virginia.  For  seventeen  years — 1609  to  1623 — Dutch  traders  were 
trafficking  on  the  Hudson  river  before  a  permanent  settlement  was  estab- 
lished in  New  York.  Fourteen  years — 1606  to  1620 — were  necessary  to 
effect  a  permanent  settlement  in  Massachusetts  ;  and  for  nine  years — 1622 
to  1 63 1 — adventurers  struggled  for  a  foothold  in  New  Hampshire.  The 
Roman  Catholics  were  only  one  year — 1634-5 — in  laying  the  foundation  of 
the  Maryland  colony.  Seven  years — 1632  to  1639  —  were  employed  in 
effecting  permanent  settlements  in  Connecticut ;  eight  years — 1636  to  1643 
— in  organizing  colonial  government  in  Rhode  Island  ;  and  about  fifty 
years — 1631  to  1682 — elapsed  from  the  landing  of  the  Swedes  on  South 
river,  before  Delaware,  New  Jersey,  and  Pennsylvania  presented  colonial 
features.  Almost  sixty  years — 1622  to  1680 — passed  by  before  the  first 
settlements  of  the  Carolinas  became  fully  developed  colonies.  But  Georgia, 
the  youngest  of  the  Thirteen  States,  had  the  foundation  of  its  colonial 
government  laid  when  Oglethorpe,  with  the  first  company  of  settlers,  began 
to  build  Savannah,  in  the  winter  of  1733.' 

1  To-mo-chi-chi  gave  his  very  heart  to  Oglethorpe  summer,  the  night-dews,  or  the  treachery  of  some  hiro- 

and  his  colony,  and  in  turn  they  all  loved  him,  and  ling  Indian  ;  he  came  into  the  large  square  of  then 

treated  him  with  fondness  and  respect.     When  he  was  council-place  to  distribute  presents  to  his  red  friends  ; 

dying,  in    1739,  at  the  age  of  nearly  one  hundred,  he  to  renew  and  explain  their  covenants  ;  to  address  them 

begged  that  his  body  might  be  buried  with  the  English  in  words  of  affection  ;  and  to  smoke  with  their  nations 

in   their   graveyard.      The    Gentleman"1  s   Magazine  the  pipe  of  peace?' 

1740,  p.    120,  contains  an  account  of  his  burial  with  In  July,  1743,  Oglethorpe  sailed  for  England,  never 

public  honors.  to  return  to  the  land  where  for  ten  years  he  had  ex« 

Oglethorpe  was  worshipped  almost  as  a  divinity,  hausted  the  benevolence  and  philanthropy  of  his  nature. 
The  Creeks,  Cherokees,  Chickasas,  and  even  the  dis-  and  sanctified  with  his  wealth  the  cause  of  religion  and 
tant  Choctas,  came  seven  hundred  miles  from  their  humanity.  He  had  fared  harder  than  any  of  the  people 
homes  on  the  Mississippi,  bringing  gifts.  When  a  great  that  were  settled  there.  Bancroft  says  of  him  :  '  He 
war  was  appr. aching  between  those  southern  tribes,  was  merciful  to  the  prisoner  ;  a  father  to  the  emigrant , 
his  power  was  sufficient  to  prevent  it,  through  the  sim-  the  unwavering  friend  of  Wesley ;  the  constant  bene- 
pie  ascendency  he  had  gained  over  the  savages.  '  In  factor  of  the  Moravians  ;  honeslly  zealous  for  the  con- 
he  summer  of  1739,  Oglethorpe,'  says  Bancroft,  '  made  version  of  the  Indians  ;  invoking  for  the  negro  the  pano- 
bis  way  through  solitary  paths,  fearless  of  the  suns  of  ply  of  the  Gospel ;  his  heart  throbbed  for  all  around 


138    STRUGGLE  FOR    THE  EMPIRE  OF  NORTH  AMERICA. 


SECTION  THIRD. 

THE    STRUGGLE    OF     FIVE    POWERS     FOR   THE    EMPIRE     OF     NORTH     AMERICA- 
SPAIN — FRANCE — ENGLAND — THE  THIRTEEN  COLONIES,  AND  THE  RED  MEN. 

At  some  future  period,  not  very  remote,  this  inviting  field  for  a  philo- 
sophical historian  will  doubtless  be  entered,  and  one  of  the  most  instructive 
and  fascinating  histories  be  written.  As  yet,  it  has  not  been  attempted. 
Many  of  its  fragmentary  parts  have  indeed  been  given  by  some  of  the 
most  charming  writers  of  England,  France,  Spain,  and  Italy,  as  well  as  by  our 
own  authors.     I  could  not  find  space  for  the  mere  enumeration  of  their  works. 

I  cannot  enter  into  the  discovery,  the  settlement,  or  the  history  of  any 
part  of  South  America,  not  even  to  glance  at  the  part  which  Portugal  enacted 
in  the  period  of  early  American  discoveries — especially  under  the  auspices  of 
her  enlightened  Prince,  King  John  —  although  the  political  hold  which  she 
gained,  has  proved  far  more  permanent  than  that  of  Spain,  her  great  rival. 

The  Empire  of  Brazil  now  stands  before  the  world  as  the  principal  power 
of  South  America.  Under  a  wise  policy,  she  has  generally  enjoyed  peace,  and 
launched  upon  the  stream  of  progress  which  it  is  fondly  hoped  will  steadily  bear 
her  forward  to  participate  in  the  highest  blessings  of  modern  civilization.  Our 
own  great  example  of  consolidated  liberty  has  long  been  her  inspiration. 
She  will  soon,  as  we  have — and  by  no  such  terrible  sacrifice — rid  herself  entirely 
of  the  incumbrance  of  negro  slavery ;  and  with  a  domain  vast  enough  for  a 
mighty  empire,  and  richer  perhaps  than  any  other  portion  of  the  globe,  and 
possessed  of  the  advantage  of  unity — which  has  never  belonged  to  the  Span- 
ish reign  in  the  New  World — Brazil  has  a  future  that  may  well  invoke  the 
highest  statesmanship,  and  fill  all  her  children  with  the  ardor  of  patriotic 
loyalty  and  pride.  Separated  far  enough  from  the  great  Republic  of  the 
North,  and  with  nothing  to  gain  by  attempted  conquest,  or  the  annexation  of 
the  fragmentary  ruins  of  Spanish  dominion  spread  around  her  borders  ;  and  at 
peace  with  all  the  world,  she  has  but  to  complete  the  emancipation  of  her  mil- 
lion and  a  half  of  laborers ;  encourage  emigration  from  Europe  ;  make  a  thorough 
exploration  of  all  her  territory,  from  the  South  Atlantic  to  the  great  chain  of 
the  Andes ;  promote  the  education  of  all  her  people ;  develop  agriculture, 
manufactures,  and  commerce,  under  the  auspices  of  freedom  for  trade  as  well 
as  for  men,  and  a  future  opens  before  her  of  unclouded  brightness.1 

him.     He  loved  to  relieve  the  indigent,  to  soothe  the  husiness  what  a  crowd  of  virtues  and  charities  could 

mourner  ;  and  his  name  became  known  as  another  ex-  cluster  around  the  heart  of  a  cavalier.'     The  life  of 

pression   for  vast  benevolence   of  soul.      Loyal   and  Oglethorpe  was  prolonged  to  near  five  score,  and  even 

brave;    choleric,   though  merciful;   versed  in  elegant  in  the  last  year  of  it,  he  was  extolled  as  the 'finest  vigor 

letters  ;  affable,  even  to  talkativeness ;  slightly  boast-  ever  seen,  the  impersonation  of  venerable  age.     His 

ful,  and  tinged  with  vanity. — he  was  ever  ready  to  ex-  faculties  were  as  bright  as  ever,  and  his  eye  was  un- 

pose  his  life  for  those  who  looked  to  him  for  defense,  dimmed.     Ever  'heroic,  romantic,  and  full  of  the  old 

A  monarchist  in   state ;    friendly  to  the  church  ;    he  gallantry,  he  was  like  the  sound  of  the  lyre,  as  it  still 

seemed,  even  in  youth,  like  one  who  had  survived  his  vibrates   after   the   spirit  of  the  age   that  sweeps  its 

times — like  a  relic  of  a  former  century,   and  a  more  strings  has  passed  away.' 
chivalrous  age,  illustrating  to   the  modern  world  of         ■  For  a  very  carefully  written  and  comprehensivt 


SPAIN—FRANCE— ENGLAND  AND    THE  AMERICANS.      139 

I  have  never  proposed  to  trace  the  progress  of  the  Spanish  in  their  dis- 
coveries, settlements,  and  establishment  of  civil  government  in  South  America, 
nor  in  the  islands  of  the  West  Indian  Archipelago.  The  course  of  narrative 
will  necessarily  lead  us  to  Mexico,  for  our  relations  with  Spain  and  the  Span- 
ish States  have  been  most  important,  from  the  acquisition  of  Florida  to  the 
independence  and  annexation  of  Texas,  the  war  with  Mexico,  and  the  ac- 
quisition of  California  and  New  Mexico.  But  these  matters  will  not  be 
reached  till  a  later  period. 

How  far  we  may  yet  be  influenced  by  the  remains  of  Spanish  power  and 
institutions  in  America,  it  is  impossible  to  conjecture.  But  it  is  rational  to 
suppose  that  those  elements  of  the  Latin  race,  which  have  proved  themselves 
too  feeble  in  their  strife  to  maintain  themselves  against  the  hardier  races  of 
the  North,  will  not  hereafter  seriously  affect  the  fortunes  of  our  republic  or 
its  people.  And  since  it  has  been  proved  abundantly  in  the  past,  that  the 
Latin  people  and  powers  have  grown  weak  just  in  proportion  as  they  attempted 
to  move  north,  it  is  believed  that  their  example  will  deter  us  from  any  further 
attempts  to  move  south.  It  will  be  far  better  for  us  to  adhere  to  the  policy 
which  the  Republic  has  always  followed,  of  preserving  the  unity  of  her  peo- 
ple, and  as  far  as  possible,  the  purity  of  their  northern  blood.  Better  by  far, 
if  these  broken  but  glittering  fragments  of  former  Spanish  dominion  are  to 
be  consolidated,  and  show  themselves  capable  of  forming  a  great  and  power- 
ful confederation,  that  they  should  do  it  by  themselves.  In  going  some  steps 
farther  than  we  have  already  advanced  towards  the  equator,  we  might,  in- 
deed, be  conferring  a  possible  boon  upon  those  mixed  communities ;  but 
no  possible  good  could  come  to  ourselves.  We  should  part  with  some  of  the 
virility  of  our  own  power,  by  attempting  to  add  political  strength  to  those 
States  by  a  union  with  our  own. 

But  in  speaking  of  the  French  dominion  in  the  New  World,  we  had  to  be 
more  minute.  Our  relations  with  France  have  been  far  more  intimate  and  sig- 
nificant. It  was  indeed  a  long  and  a  hard  struggle  which  our  early  settlers  went 
through  in  the  French  and  Indian  War, — at  which  we  are  soon  to  glance — and 

historical  sketch  of  Brazil,  sec  the  article  '  Brazil,'  in  gradual  abolition  of  slavery.     The  act  emancipated  the 

Appletons'  New  Cyclopedia,  vol.  iii. — now  in  course  slaves  owned  by  the  government,  and  within  fourteen 

of  publication,  and  constituting  altogether  the  most  months   upwards  of   30,000    slaves  were  manumitted 

valuable  contribution  to  literature  yet  made  on  this  con-  by  private  individuals  ;  and  the  system  of  appreniice- 

tinent.     In  all  matters  concerning  America,  it  is  of  ab-  ship  is  carried  out  in  such  good  faith,  that  it  will  hardly 

solute  authority.    After  very  close  examination  of  many  live  out  its  allotted  term  of  twenty-one  years.    The 

of  its  Titles,  I  have  found  it  so  uniformly  exact  and  value  of  the  imports  for  the  three  years  ending  in  1869 

reliable,  that  I  have  felt  safe  in  following  it  implicitly  in  was   $725,400,000 — the    exports,    $272,000,000.      One 

the  final  revision  of  this  work.      Probably  no  other  quarter  of  these  exports  were  to  the  United  States, 
similar  publication,  even  in  Europe,  has  been  prepared  Brazil  is  advancing  in  popular  education.     She  has 

with  such  unwearied  vigilance.  4i437  schools,  of  which  3.603  are  public,  and  devoted  to 

From  this  article  I  gather  the  latest  facts  known  primary  education.     The  annual  cost  of  all  the  public 

ibout  Brazil,  down  to  last  year— 1873.  schools  is  $  1,681,000,  or  nearly  15  percent,  of  the  annual 

No  regular  census  has  yet  been  taken,  but  it  cannot  revenue  of  all  the  twenty-one  provinces.  The  number 
rary  much  from  ten  millions — an  agglomeration  of  of  scholars  enrolled  is  134,000.  The  number  of  chil- 
nrxny  races.  The  whites  number  about  one-third  of  dren  attending  school  is  rapidly  increasing.  The 
tl  :  entire  population.  The  other  two-thirds  are  made  whole  educational  system  is  under  the  jurisdiction  of 
up  of  mixed  Indian  and  negro,  and  Africans  ;  the  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  and  the  control  of  the  Gen- 
latter  constituting  the  largest  unmixed  race  in  the  Em-  eral  Assembly.  The  Emperor,  Don  Pedro  II.,  is  an 
pire.  In  1850,  the  slave-trade  was  effectually  sup-  enlightened  ruler,  and  Brazil  seems  to  be  advancing 
pressed,  and  a  law  was  passed,  Sept.  28,  1871,  for  the  securely,  if  not  rapidly,  in  civilization. 


140  CAUSES  OF   THE  SEVEN   YEARS'    WAR. 

no  statesman  of  that  time  would  have  prophesied  the  peaceful  relations  thai 
so  soon  afterwards  grew  up  between  France  and  the  United  States.  But  the 
fact  is  easily  explained.  England  and  France  were  struggling  for  the  Empire 
of  North  America.  Nor  was  it  looked  on  as  a  war  between  Americans  and 
Frenchmen.  It  was  not  a  war  between  Louis  and  the  Thirteen  Colonies  :  it 
was  a  war  between  the  King  of  France  and  the  King  of  England ;  and  it  was 
regarded  as  of  infinite  importance  to  both,  to  preserve  their  dominion  in  the 
New  World. 

No  sooner  had  the  French  power  yielded,  and  its  last  ensign  in  North 
America  had  disappeared,  than  the  third  power  was  seen  to  enter  the  field  ; 
and  that  power  was  the  Thirteen  Colonies,  who  were  preparing  to  construct 
here  an  American,  and  not  a  European  Empire. 

This  idea  did  not  early  dawn  upon  the  mind  of  Europe.  It  was  an  Ameri- 
can idea  ;  and  when  once  fairly  conceived,  it  was  bound  to  work  itself  out. 
We  heard  no  longer  of  any  animosities  between  the  French  and  the  Ameri- 
can people.  On  the  contrary,  France  became  our  ally  ;  and  the  strange  spectacle 
was  witnessed  of  French  officers  and  soldiers,  who  had  fought  against  each 
other  in  the  French  and  Indian  war,  now  fighting  side  by  side,  as  brothers, 
against  a  common  foe  that  in  all  lands,  and  on  all  oceans,  was  attempting  to 
sweep  the  French  nation  out  of  existence,  while  the  colossal  power  of  Eng- 
land was  to  dictate  political  institutions  to  the  rising  people  of  the  American 
colonies,  and  repress  every  aspiration  here  for  an  independent  life. 

The  Indian  was  the  Fifth  Power  contending  for  the  dominion  of  the 
New  World,  and  he  has  not  yet  given  up  the  battle.  He  has  survived  every 
invader  and  oppressor.  The  Spaniard,  the  Frenchman,  the  Englishman  :  and 
now  if  we  are  determined  to  inflict  upon  him  the  last  wrong  he  can  ever 
suffer  on  the  earth,  we  can  decree  his  extinction. 

Causes  of  the  Seven  Years'  War. — With  the  discovery  of  the  New  World, 
the  rivalries  of  France  and  England  for  its  possession  began ;  and  they  con- 
tinued till  the  French  dominion  in  America  went  down  before  the  united 
forces  of  England  and  her  colonial  allies.  As  early  as  the  granting  of  the 
charter  to  the  West  India  Company  by  England,  Richelieu,  the  powerful 
minister  of  France,  made  a  vain  effort  to  secure  the  commerce  of  Asia  for  his 
country  ;  and  the  English  had  no  sooner  occupied  Barbadoes  than  the  French 
took  a  part  of  St.  Christopher's.  The  English  increasing  their  possessions 
till  they  finally  added  to  them  Jamaica,  the  French  settled  on  Martinique  and 
Guadeloupe,  founded  a  colony  at  Cayenne,  and  took  possession  of  the  west 
of  Hayti.  This  extention  reached  the  African  coast :  from  Sierra  Leone 
to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope ;  and  planting  a  colony  on  the  island  of  Mada- 
gascar, the  maritime  power  of  France  even  exceeded  that  of  England :  for  a 
while  she  had  even  a  larger  colonial  system.  But  she  seemed  to  be  destitute 
of  those  qualities  in  which  England  excelled  all  the  world — genius  for  control- 
ling colonies,  and  thereby  augmenting  her  commercial  importance. 


CLAIM  TO    THE  REGION  OF  NEW  FRANCE.  141 

The  fiercest  rivalry,  however,  was  for  the  territory  of  North  America. 
At  the  opening  of  the  Seventeenth  Century,  when  American  colonization 
began  to  flourish,  Louis  XIV.  claimed  sovereignty  over  by  far  the  largest 
part  of  the  continent.  A  mighty  struggle  was  to  take  place,  to  determine 
who  should  be  master.  We  have  already  seen  that  the  French  preceded 
the  English  in  colonial  enterprise  in  the  northern  part  of  the  continent; 
that  settlements  were  made  on  the  St.  Lawrence  before  they  were  at  James- 
town ;  that  the  missionaries  of  France  had  established  a  Roman  church  in 
the  eastern  portion  of  Maine,  years  before  the  Pilgrims  landed.  Four  or 
five  years  prior  to  that  event,  Le  Caron,  an  humble  Franciscan,  who 
attended  Champlain,  had  passed  into  the  hunting-grounds  of  the  Wyan- 
dots ;  and  bound  by  his  vows  to  the  life  of  a  beggar,  had  on  foot,  or  pad- 
dling a  bark  canoe,  gone  onward,  and  still  onward,  taking  alms  of  the 
savages,  till  he  reached  the  shores  of  Lake  Huron.  While  Quebec  con- 
tained scarce  fifty  inhabitants,  priests  of  the  Franciscan  order — Le  Caron, 
Viel,  Sagard — had  labored  for  years  as  missionaries  in  Upper  Canada,  or 
made  their  way  to  the  neutral  Huron  tribe  that  dwelt  on  the  waters  of  the 
Niagara. 

In  1627,  Richelieu,  Champlain,  Razilly,  with  several  also  of  the  rich 
French  merchants,  received  a  charter  from  Louis  XIII.,  containing  a  grant 
to  New  France,  which  embraced  the  St.  Lawrence  and  its  great  basin,  and 
all  the  rivers  that  flow  into  the  Atlantic ;  as  well  as  to  Florida,  the  name  by 
which  the  whole  country  south  and  west  of  Virginia  was  known.  To  all 
this  region  claim  was  made,  and  it  was  all  laid  down  on  the  map  as  New 
France  :  its  assertion  brought  on  the  collision  known  as  the  Seven  Years' 
War.1 

1  Bancroft  has  given  one  of  the  most  effective  de-  only  by  influence  over  mind.  Their  vows  wet,  pov 
scriptions  of  the  character  and  the  exploits  of  the  Jesuit  erty,  chastity,  absolute  obedience,  and  a  constant 
missionaries  anywhere  to  be  found.  readiness  to  go  on  missions  against  heresy  or  heathen- 
Religious  zeal,  not  less  than  commercial  ambition,  ism.  Their  colleges  became  the  best  schools  in  the 
had  influenced  France  to  recover  Canada ;  and  Cham-  world.  Emancipated,  in  a  great  degree,  from  the 
plain,  its  governor,  whose  imperishable  name  will  rival  cloistral  forms,  separated  from  domestic  ties,  consti- 
with  posterity  the  fame  of  Smith  and  of  Hudson,  ever  tuting  a  community  essentially  intellectual  as  well 
disinterested  and  compassionate,  full  of  honor  and  as  essentially  plebeian,  bound  together  by  the  most 
probity,  of  ardent  devotion  and  burning  zeal,  esteemed  perfect  organization,  and  having  for  their  end  a  con- 
'  the  salvation  of  a  soul  worth  more  than  the  conquest  trol  over  opinion  among  the  scholars  and  courts  of 
of  an  empire.'  The  commercial  monopoly  of  a  privi-  Europe  and  throughout  the  habitable  globe.  .  .  . 
leged  company  could  not  foster  a  colony;  the  climate  Thus  it  was  neither  commercial  enterprise  nor 
of  the  country  round  Quebec,  '  where  summer  hurries  royal  ambition  which  carried  the  power  of  France 
through  the  sky,'  did  not  invite  to  agriculture  ;  no  into  the  heart  of  our  continent :  the  motive  was  re- 
persecutions  of  Catholics  swelled  the  stream  of  emi-  ligion.  Religious  enthusiasm  colonized  New  Eng- 
gration  ;  and  at  first  there  was  little,  except  religious  land;  and  religious  enthusiasm  founded  Montreal, 
enthusiasm,  to  give  vitality  to  the  province.  Touched  made  a  conquest  of  the  wilderness  on  the  upper 
by  the  simplicity  of  the  order  of  St.  Francis,  Cham-  lakes,  and  explored  the  Mississippi.  Puritanism  gave 
olain  had  selected  its  priests  of  the  contemplative  class  New  England  its  worship,  and  its  schools ;  the  Roman 
for  his  companions;  'for  they  were  free  from  am-  Church  created  for  Canada  its  altars,  its  hospitals, 
bition.'  But  the  aspiring  honor  of  the  Gallican  church  and  its  seminaries.  The  influence  of  Calvin  can  be 
*vas  interested  ;  a  prouder  sympathy  was  awakened  traced  in  every  New  England  village ;  in  Canada, 
imong  the  devotees  at  court ;  and,  the  Franciscans  the  monuments  of  feudalism  and  the  Catholic  Church 
having,  as  a  mendicant  order,  been  excluded  from  the  stand  side  by  side ;  and  the  names  of  Montmorenci 
rocks  and  deserts  of  the  New  World,  the  office  of  and  Bourbon,  of  Levi  and  Con d^,  are  mingled  with 
converting  the  heathen  of  Canada,  and  thus  enlarging  memorials  of  St.  Athanasius  and  Augustin,  of  St 
•he  borders  of  French  dominion,  was  intrusted  solely  Francis  of  Assisi,  and  Ignatius  Loyola. 
Jo  the  Jesuits.  Within  three  years  after  the  second  occupation  of 
The  establishment  of  'the  Society  of  Jesus'  by  Canada,  the  number  of  Jesuit  priests  in  the  province 
?«oyola  had  been  contemporary  with  the  Reformation,  reached  fifteen  ;  and  every  tradition  bears  testimony 
•f  which  it  was  designed  to  arrest  the  progress;  to  their  worth.  They  had  the  faults  of  ascetic  super- 
*nd  its  complete  organization  belongs  to  the  period  stition  ;  but  the  horrors  of  a  Canadian  life  in  tha 
when  the  first  full  edition  of  Calvin's  Institutes  saw  wilderness  were  resisted  by  an  invincible  passive 
the  light.  Its  members  were,  by  its  rules,  never  to  courage  and  a  deep  internal  tranquillity.  Away  from  th« 
prelates,  and  could  gain  power  and  distinctioi  amenities  of  life,  away  from  the  opportunities  of  vain* 


142     FRENCH  AND  AMERICAN  POPULATION  COMPARED, 

The  previous  collisions  in  America  between  the  English  and  the  French 
colonies  had  grown  out  of  hostilities  between  these  powers  in  other  parts  of 
the  world.  But  the  great  struggle  now  to  take  place,  was  for  the  supremacy 
of  North  America.  More  than  a  million  English  colonists  were  settled  on 
the  Atlantic  coast,  stretching  a  thousand  miles,  from  the  Penobscot  to  the 
St.  Mary,  and  extending  back  to  the  Alleghany  ranges,  and  northward  to  the 
St.  Lawrence.1  The  number  of  French  settlers  on  the  continent  could  not 
have  exceeded  one  hundred  thousand ;  but  their  chain  of  settlements  reached 
from  the  Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence  to  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi.  It  would  be 
thought  that  they  must  have  held  their  power  by  a  very  frail  tenure ;  but 
such  was  by  no  means  the  case.  The  Jesuit  missionaries  were  the  first  path- 
finders of  empire  in  the  New  World.  In  all  history,  no  parallel  can  be  found 
to  the  daring  and  endurance  of  this  wonderful  class  of  men,  as  they  moved 
up  the  two  arterial  rivers — from  the  St.  Lawrence  along  the  chain  of  the 
great  lakes,  and  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  to  the  head  waters  of  the  Missis- 
sippi. Winning  through  kindness  the  favor  of  the  Indian  tribes,  and  inspir- 
ing their  awe  by  the  imposing  ceremonies  of  religion;  displaying  a  zeal 
known  only  to  the  disciples  of  Loyola,  they  gained  a  sway  over  the  savage 
mind  which  no  other  religion  or  race  of  men  has  ever  been  able  to  command. 
They  seized  upon  all  the  strong  points  where  wealth  has  since  centred,  and 
commerce  made  her  halting-places  on  the  great  lines  of  transportation — 
Quebec,  Montreal,  Niagara,  Detroit,  Pittsburg,  and  the  line  of  the  Mississippi. 
Few  and  scattered  as  they  were,  these  settlements  were  all  fortified ;  and 
when  the  collision  with  English  power  came,  they  served  as  a  continuous 
chain  of  military  posts.  Their  control  over  nearly  all  the  savage  tribes 
through  these  vast  regions,  except  the  Six  Nations,  gave  them  facilities  for 
carrying  on  war  altogether  disproportionate  to  the  amount  of  their  population. 
As  early  as  1683  they  had  founded  Detroit;  Kaskaskia  one,  and  Vincennes 
six  years  later;  and  New  Orleans  in  171 7. 

The  capture  of  Louisburg  in  1 745  had  roused  among  the  French  a  spirit 
of  determination  to  resist  the  encroachments  of  the  British  colonists.     They 

glory,  they  became  dead  to  the  world,  and  possessed  For  the  southern  provinces,   to  Virginia  he   assigns 

their  souls  in  unalterable  peace.     The  few  who  lived  one  hundred  and  sixty-eight  thousand  whites ;  North 

to   grow  old,   though    bowed   by  the  toils  of  a    long  Carolina,    seventy   thousand ;     South  Carolina,    forty 

mission,  still  kindled  with  the  fervor  of  apostolic  zeal,  thousand  :  or  to  the  whole  country  south  of  the  Poto- 

The    history  of  their  labors   is    connected  with    the  mac,  two  hundred  and  eighty-three  thousand, 

origin  of  every  celebrated    town    in    the    anuals    of  There  were  thus  five  or  six  of  the  colonies  which 

French  America  :  not  a  cape  was  turned,  nor  a  river  singly  contained  a  greater  white  population  than  all 

entered,  but  a  Jesuit  led  the  way. — Bancroft,  vol.  iii.  Canada,  while  the  aggregate  of  all  the  colonies  exceed- 

pp.  119-121.  ed  that  of  Canada  fourteen-fold. 

1  Bancroft  estimates  the  population  of  the  Thirteen  He  distributes  the  African  population,  which  even 

Colonies  in  the  beginning  of  the  French  War,  at  one  mil-  then,  as  ever  afterwards,  was  determined  chiefly  by 

lion  one  hundred  and  sixty-five  thousand  whites,  and  climate,   by  assigning  six    thousand  to   Maine,    New 

two  hundred  and  sixty-three  thousand  negroes.     After  Hampshire,  and    Massachusetts  ;    to    Rhode  Island, 

his  exhaustive  investigations,  these  estimates  may  be  four  thousand  five  hundred,  and  to  Connecticut,  three 

considered  as  final.     He  distributes  them  as  follows  :  thousand  five  hundred ;  or  fourteen  thousand  in  all 

)f  European  descent,  fifty  thousand    dwelt  in  New  New  England. 

Hampshire  ;    two    hundred  and   seven    thousand    in  New  York  had  eleven  thousand  negroes  ;  Pennsyl- 

Massachusetts  ;  thirty-five  thousand  in  Rhode  Island  ;  vania,  with  Delaware,  the  same  number ;  New  Jersey, 

and  one  hundred  and  thirty-three  thousand  in  Conncc-  five  thousand  five  hundred  ;  and  Maryland  forty-four 

ticut :  which  gave  to  New  England  four  hundred  and  thousand  :  giving  to  the  central  colonies  seventy-one 

twenty-five  thousand  souls.  thousand. 

Of  the  middle  colonies,  New  Vork  had  eighty-five  Of  the  southern  colonies,  Virginia  had  one  hundred 

thousand  ;     New    Jersey,   seventy-three     thousand  ;  and  sixteen  thousand  ;  North  Carolina,  twenty  thou- 

Pennsylvania,  with  Delaware,  one  hundred  and  ninety-  sand  ;  South  Carolina,  forty  thousand  ;  Georgia,   two 

five  thousand  ;   Maryland,  one  hundred  and  four  thou-  thousand  ;  thus  assigning  to  the  country  south  of  tho 

sand  :  in  all,  four  hundred  and  fifty-seven  thousand.  Potomac,  one  hundred  and  seventy-eight  thousand. 


WASHINGTON  BEGINS  HIS  MILITARY  CAREER.  H3 

had  built  vessels  of  considerable  sue  at  Fort  Frontenac,  on  Lake  Ontario, 
and  not  only  strengthened  Fort  Niagara,  but  before  the  year  1756  they  had 
a  cordon  of  sixty  fortified  places  between  the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  mouth  of 
the  Mississippi.  By  virtue  of  their  explorations  of  that  mighty  river  and 
its  tributaries,  and  by  settlements  along  the  banks,  they  claimed  the  whole 
domain  westward  to  the  Pacific. 

The  Immediate  Cause  of  the  French  War. — In  1 749  George  II.  granted 
to  The  Ohio  Company  six  hundred  thousand  acres  of  land  on  the  south- 
eastern bank  of  the  Ohio  river.  Some  of  the  surveyors  engaged  in  settling 
these  boundaries,  were  seized  and  imprisoned  by  the  French  in  1753.  Appre 
hensive  that  their  commerce  would  be  cut  off,  and  their  chain  of  communica 
tion  between  the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  broken,  the  French 
began  to  erect  forts  between  Lake  Erie  and  the  Alleghany  river,  near  the 
western  line  of  Pennsylvania. 

George  Washington  begins  his  Career. — The  colonists  of  Virginia  were 
interested  in  this  grant  to  the  Ohio  Company.  In  pursuance  of  orders  from 
the  British  Government,  Governor  Dinwiddie  dispatched  young  George 
Washington  with  a  remonstrance  to  the  French  commander.  He  had  not 
yet  reached  his  twenty-second  year ;  but  he  had  a  thorough  knowledge  of 
those  wild  regions  which,  as  a  surveyor,  he  had  explored,  and  having  displayed 
military  taste  and  talent  as  adjutant-general  of  one  of  the  four  militia  districts 
of  Virginia,  he  was  considered  better  qualified  than  any  other  person  for  this 
delicate  and  hazardous  mission.  He  had  to  traverse  a  distance  of  four  hun- 
dred miles,  through  the  snows  of  winter,  liable  at  any  moment  to  encounter 
hostile  and  savage  tribes.  Deeming  it  wiser  and  safer  to  have  a  small  attend- 
ance, he  took  with  him  only  three  companions ;  and  after  the  severest  hard- 
ships and  exposures,  in  less  than  six  weeks  reached  the  French  outpost  at 
Venango,  at  the  junction  of  French  Creek  and  the  Alleghany  river,  where 
the  village  of  Franklin  now  stands.  During  a  night  of  revel,  in  which  the 
French  officers  became  gay  over  the  hospitalities  they  were  extending  to  the 
young  Virginian,  they  incautiously  revealed  their  plans,  and  the  next  morning 
he  hastened  on  to  the  headquarters  of  St.  Pierre,  at  Le  Boeuf.  After  courteous 
treatment  for  four  days,  the  French  commander  dismissed  him  with  his  sealed 
reply,  and  Washington  plunged  off  once  more  into  the  wilderness. 

The  safety,  judgment,  and  dispatch  with  which  he  had  executed  his  haz- 
ardous mission,  won  for  Washington  the  warmest  commendation  of  the 
govemor.  He  had  displayed  qualities  so  rare,  those  who  knew  him  best 
declared,  that  no  achievement  of  his  could  afterwards  surprise  them.  In  re- 
counting the  wonderful  incidents  of  his  future  career,  the  leading  men  of  Vir- 
ginia often  remarked,  that  they  looked  upon  no  subsequent  act  of  his  life 
with  so  much  admiration. 

The  French  commander  had  sent  back  an  unsatisfactory  reply.  He 
peremptori  y  refused  to  withdraw  his  troops  from  the  disputed  territory,  claim- 


144      FIRST  BLOOD   SHED  IN   THE  SEVEN   YEARS'    WAR. 

ing  that  he  was  carrying  out  the  orders  of  his  superior  officer,  the  Marquis  du 
Quesne,  at  Montreal.  Prompt  in  courage  and  patriotism,  the  House  of  Bur- 
gesses voted  money  for  an  expedition,  and  issued  the  first  general  call  to  theii 
sister  colonies  for  union  against  a  common  foe.  None  of  them  responded, 
except  North  Carolina,  whose  legislature  voted  four  hundred  men  ;  but  volun- 
teers from  South  Carolina  and  New  York  were  soon  on  their  way  to  join  the 
Virginians,  of  whom  six  hundred  were  now  organized  into  a  regiment,  under 
the  command  of  Col.  Joshua  Fry,  Washington  being  chosen  Major. 

Washington  Takes  the  Field,  April  2,  1754. — In  command  of  an  ad- 
vanced detachment,  Major  Washington  began  his  march  toward  the  Ohio. 
At  midnight  on  the  28th  of  May,  when  he  was  within  forty  miles  of  Fort  Du- 
quesne — now  Pittsburg — with  a  small  body,  he  surprised  a  scouting  party 
of  fifty  of  the  enemy,  killing  their  commander  and  nine  of  his  men,  fifteen 
only  escaping.  This  was  the  first  blood  shed  in  that  long  and  terrible  coiiflict. 
Only  two  days  later  Col.  Fry  died,  and  the  sole  command  devolved  upon 
Washington.  Being  joined  by  the  rest  of  his  regiment,  he  pushed  his  four  hun- 
dred men  forward  toward  Fort  Duquesne.  But  learning  from  his  scouts  that 
De  Villiers — whose  brother  had  fallen  in  the  first  skirmish,  and  whose  death 
must  now  be  avenged — was  approaching  with  a  large  force  of  Indians,  he  fell 
back  on  Fort  Necessity,  a  place  he  had  already  fortified,  and  prepared  as 
best  he  could  to  meet  a  superior  force.  The  young  commander  now  had  the 
first  opportunity  to  show  his  military  genius.  He  was  to  resist  the  onset  of 
more  than  fifteen  hundred  men,  of  whom  upwards  of  one  thousand  were  Indian 
warriors,  led  by  an  accomplished  commander.  But  with  such  heavy  odds 
against  him,  he  waged  that  hard  battle  for  eleven  hours,  and  then  yielded  only 
to  honorable  terms  of  capitulation.  Washington  had  fought  his  first  battle  : 
and  during  the  whole  of  his  military  life  it  is  doubtful  if  he  ever  exhibited 
higher  qualities  as  a  commander,  or  foreshadowed  more  clearly  his  military 
fame.  On  the  following  morning,  the  4th  of  July — the  dies  faustus  of  our 
history,  as  we  shall  have  occasion  so  often  to  notice — Washington  marched 
out  of  his  little  stockade  with  his  regiment  for  Virginia. 

First  Germ  of  a  Political  Union  of  the  Colonies,  July  4,  1754. — While  the 
young  Virginia  leader  was  conducting  his  first  campaign  on  the  western  fron- 
tier, a  political  movement,  which  was  to  be  attended  with  consequences  of 
the  utmost  magnitude,  was  taking  place  on  the  distant  banks  of  the  Hudson. 
Perceiving  that  a  collision  between  the  English  and  French  in  North  America 
was  inevitable,  the  British  ministry  had  advised  the  colonies  to  meet  in  coun- 
cil, through  their  delegates,  to  prepare  for  the  approaching  struggle.  The 
friendship  of  the  Six  Nations  must  be  preserved,  and  other  measures  of 
security  devised.  The  colonies  were  all  invited  to  send  delegates  to  this 
Congress. 

First  Colonial  Convention  meets    at  Albany ,  June  19,   1754. — Commis- 


FRANKLIN  IN   THE  FIRST  AMERICAN  CONGRESS.         145 

sioners  responded  from  every  colony  north  of  the  Potomac ;  and  even 
Virginia  was  represented  by  the  presiding  officer  of  the  convention,  Delancey, 
the  Lieutenant-Governor  of  New  York.  It  was  an  imposing,  if  not  a  numer- 
ous assembly  ;  composed  of  men  who  were  afterwards  to  win  the  honorable 
title  of  Fathers  of  the  American  Republic.  Amongst  them  was  the  sage  Hutch- 
inson, who  had  '  rescued  Massachusetts  from  the  thraldom  of  paper  money  ; ' 
Hopkins,  the  Rhode  Island  patriot ;  Pitkin,  '  the  faithful,'  of  Connecticut ; 
Smith,  «  the  liberal,'  of  New  York,  and  Tasker,  of  Maryland. 

Benjamin  Franklin. — Greatest  of  all  our  political  seers,  that  wisest  and 
deepest  statesman  America  has  ever  had,  Benjamin  Franklin,  then  in  the 
early  prime  of  his  wonderful  life — forty-eight  years  of  age,  twenty-six  years 
older  than  Washington — stood  the  controlling  spirit.  On  the  morning  of  the 
Fourth  of  July,  this  delegate  from  Pennsylvania  had  matured  and  now  sub- 
mitted a  plan  of  confederation,  which  crystallized  under  royal  authority,  the 
first  clearly  defined  project  of  colonial  confederation  ever  proposed.1  It 
could  not  be  imposed  by  authority,  but  it  was  ordered  to  be  presented  for  the 
consideration  of  the  colonies,  and  to  be  laid  before  the  Board  of  Trade  in 
London,  which  mainly  controlled  the  affairs  of  the  colonies.  Nor  was  it 
fully  carried  into  effect,  for  it  was  too  democratic  to  suit  England,  and  too 
aristocratic  for  some  of  the  colonies.  But  the  germ  of  union  was  planted  ; 
the  thought  of  fraternization  was  clearly  presented  ;  the  spirit  was  brooding 
over  the  bosom  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies,  out  of  which  National  life  was  to 
come.  The  idea  of  federal  union  was  then  formed  for  defence  against  two 
common  enemies — the  French,  with  whom  we  had  then  no  affiliations,  and 
against  whom  we  had  inherited  some  of  the  prejudices  of  Englishmen — and 
the  savage  tribes,  most  of  whom  we  regarded  as  merciless  foes.  And  thus, 
in  this  old  Dutch  town,  sat  the  first  American  Congress,  listening  to  the 
plan  of  Benjamin  Franklin  on  the  fourth  of  July,  1754,  twenty-two 
years  before  the  great  declaration. 

The  fire  was  now  spreading  through  the  colonies ;  but  all  was  confusion. 
The  Indian  allies  of  the  French  began  their  depredations  along  the  frontiers 
of  New  England,  while  the  tribes  beyond  the  Alleghanies,  inspired  by  French 
emissaries  with  the  murderous  spirit  of  extermination  towards  our  settlers, 
were  active  in  the  west.  Some  of  the  colonies  voted  money  and  troops,  and 
numerous  but  ineffectual  preparations  were  made  for  the  impending  struggle. 
England  gave  the  trifling  sum  of  fifty  thousand  dollars  to  assist  the  colonies, 
and  commissioned  Governor  Sharpe,  of  Maryland,  as  commander-in-chief  of 
all  the  colonial  forces.  But  his  appointment  met  with  no  favor ;  while  certain 
unwise  military  measures  of  Dinwiddie  had  been  followed  by  disputes  about 
rank,  which  ended  even  in  the  resignation  of  Colonel  Washington  himself. 

1  New  England  colonies  in  their  infancy  had  given  enduring  life.     As  he  descended  the  Hudson,  the  peo- 

birth   to  a  confederacy       William   Penn,  in  1697,  had  pie  of  New  York  thronged  about  him  to  welcome  him  ; 

proposed  an  annual  congress  of  all  the  provinces  on  the  and  he,  who  had  first  entered  their  city  as  a  runaway 

ci'iitmriM  of  America,  with  power  to  regulate  commerce,  apprentice,    was  revered   as    the   leader   of  American 

Franklin  rrvived  the  great  idea,  and  breathed   into  it  union. — Bancro':    voL  iv.,  p.  125. 


146  CAMPAIGN    OF  1755.    ZEAL   OF   THE   COLONISTS. 

The  Campaign  of  1755. — War  was  about  to  be  declared  between  France 
and  England,  and  some  vigorous  measures  had  to  be  adopted  by  the  British 
Government.  Gen.  Braddock,  an  Irish  officer  of  distinction,  arrived  in  the 
Chesapeake  on  the  20th  of  February,  1755,  with  two  regiments  of  his  country- 
men in  the  regular  service.  He  also  bore  a  commission  as  commander-in- 
chief  of  all  the  British  and  colonial  forces  in  America.  In  the  following 
April,  six  of  the  colonial  Governors,  at  his  request,  met  him  in  conven- 
tion at  Alexandria,  to  settle  on  a  vigorous  campaign.1  Their  deliberations 
resulted  in  planning  three  separate  expeditions  ;  one  under  General  William 
Johnson,  against  Crown  Point,  on  Lake  Champlain ;  a  second  against 
Niagara  and  Frontenac,  to  be  commanded  by  Shirley,  Colonial  Governor  of 
Massachusetts ;  and  the  third,  and  chief,  against  Fort  Duquesne,  under  the 
immediate  command  of  Braddock  himself.  Separate  from  the  action  of  this 
convention,  a  fourth  expedition  was  also  matured  by  Shirley  and  Governor 
Lawrence,  of  Nova  Scotia,  to  wage  a  war  of  expulsion,  and  if  necessary,  of 
extermination,  against  all  the  French  in  that  province,  as  well  as  throughout 
the  settlements  of  Acadia. 

Patriotic  Zeal  of  the  Colonists. — With  the  exception  of  Pennsylvania, 
whose  people  were  too  deeply  imbued  with  the  peaceful  spirit  of  their  found- 
er, and  Georgia,  then  too  feeble  and  poor  to  proffer  any  aid,  all  the  colonies, 
through  their  legislatures,  voted  men,  money  and  munitions  of  war.  It  was 
a  hearty  co-operation  between  them  and  the  Imperial  government :  it  being 
evident  to  all  that  the  hour  had  come  to  determine  which  empire  should  rule 
America. 

The  Doom  of  Acadia. — The  movements  of  Shirley  and  Lawrence  were  the 
most  rapid  and  energetic,  and  the  troops  of  Massachusetts  and  Nova  Scotia 
were  first  in  the  field.  As  early  as  the  20th  of  May,  Gen.  John  Winslow, 
the  great-grandson  of  Edward  Winslow,  the  third  Governor  of  Plymouth — a 
bold  and  competent  soldier — sailed  from  Boston  with  three  thousand  men  for 
the  Bay  of  Fundy.  Colonel  Monckton,  with  three  hundred  British  regulars, 
took  command  of  the  united  forces,  and  after  capturing  the  French  forts,  pro- 
claimed martial  law  over  the  whole  region.  Sad  enough  is  it  that  this  memo- 
rable war,  which  was  to  be  distinguished  by  so  many  brilliant  deeds,  and  change 
the  fortunes  of  the  whole  continent,  should  have  been  opened  by  so  dreadful 
an  act  of  inhumanity  as  we  must  now  record.  It  was  nothing  less  than  the 
expulsion,  or  extermination  of  the  entire  French  population  of  Acadia.  It  had 
been  settled  in  the  British  councils,  and  General  Winslow  was  intrusted  with 
the  execution  of  the  inhuman  decree.  The  plea  was  one  of  self-defence,  of 
course  ; — the  inhabitants  would  join  their  countrymen  in  Canada,  and  they 
must  be  wiped  out.  '  The  innocent  and  happy  people  were  seized  in  their 
houses,  fields  and  churches,   and  conveyed  on  board  the  English  vessels 

1  These   Governors  were   Dinwiddle,  of  Virginia;     and  Shirley,  of  Massachusetts.    Admiral  Keppel,  com 
Sharpe,   of   Maryland  ;    Dobbs,   of    North  Carolina ;     mander  of  die  British  fleet,  also  assisted* 
Morris,  of  Pennsylvania  ;   Delancey,  of    New  York ; 


TERRIBLE   DOOM  OF  ACADIA. 


14! 


Families  were  broken,  never  to  be  united ;  and  to  complete  the  surrender  of 
those  who  fled  to  the  woods,  their  starvation  was  insured  by  a  total  destruc- 
tion of  their  growing  crops.  The  Acadians  were  stripped  of  everything,  and 
those  who  were  carried  away,  were  scattered  among  the  English  colonies, 
helpless  beggars,  to  die  heart-broken  in  a  strange  land.  In  one  short  month 
their  paradise  had  become  a  desolation,  and  a  happy  people  were  crushed 
into  the  dust'  ■ 

Braddock's  Expedition,  June  10,   1755. — However  much    this  General 


1  Lossing's  Hist,  of  the  U.  S.,  p.  185. 

In  his  touching  description  of  these  disgraceful  oc- 
currences, Bancroft  gives  the  following  relation  : — 

To  hunt  them  into  the  net  was  impracticable  ;  artifice 
was  therefore  resorted  to.  By  a  general  proclamation,  on 
one  and  the  same  day,  the  scarcely  conscious  victims, 
'both  old  men  and  young  men,  as  well  as  all  the  lads 
of  ten  years  of  age,'  were  peremptorily  ordered  to  as- 
semble at  their  respective  posts  on  the  appointed  5th  of 
September.  They  obeyed.  At  Grand  Pre,  for  example, 
four  hundred  and  eighteen  unarmed  men  came  together. 
They  were  marched  into  the  church  and  its  avenues 
were  closed,  when  Winslow,  the  American  commander, 
placed  himself  in  their  centre,  and  spoke  : — '  You  are 
convened  together  to  manifest  to  you  his  Majesty's 
final  resolution  to  the  French  inhabitants  of  this  his 
province.  Your  lands  and  tenements,  cattle  of  all 
kinds,  and  live  stock  of  all  sorts,  are  forfeited  to  the 
crown,  and  you  yourselves  are  to  be  removed  from  this 
his  province.  I  am,  through  his  Magesty's  goodness, 
directed  to  allow  you  liberty  to  carry  your  money  and 
household  goods  as  many  as  you  can,  without  dis- 
commoding the  vessels  you  go  in,' — and  he  then  de- 
clared them  the  king's  prisoners.  Their  wives  and 
families  shared  their  lot :  their  sons,  527  in  number, 
their  daughters,  576  ;  in  the  whole,  women  and  babes 
and  old  men  and  children  all  included,  1923  souls.  The 
blow  was  sudden  ;  they  had  left  home  but  for  the 
morning,  and  they  never  were  to  return.  Their  catde 
were  to  stay  unfed  in  the  stalls,  their  fires  to  die  out  on 
their  hearths.  They  had  for  the  first  day  even  no  food 
for  themselves  or  their  children,  and  were  compelled  to 
beg  for  bread. 

The  10th  of  September  was  the  day  for  the  embarka- 
tion of  a  part  of  the  exiles.  They  were  drawn  up  six 
deep,  and  the  young  men,  161  in  number,  were  ordered 
to  march  first  on  board  the  vessel.  They  could  leave 
their  farms  and  cottages,  the  shady  rock  on  which  they 
had  reclined,  their  herds  and  their  garners  ;  but  nature 
yearned  within  them,  and  they  would  not  be  separated 
from  their  parents.  Yet  of  what  avail  was  the  frenzied 
despair  of  the  unarmed  youth  ?  They  had  not  one 
weapon  ;  the  bayonet  drove  them  to  obey ;  and  they 
marched  slowly  and  heavily  from  the  chapel  to  the 
shore,  between  women  and  children,  who,  kneeling, 
prayed  for  blessings  on  their  heads,  they  themselves 
weeping  and  praying,  and  singing  hymns.  The  seniors 
went  next ;  the  wives  and  children  must  wait  till  other 
transport  vessels  arrive.  The  delay  had  its  horrors.  The 
wretched  people  left  behind,  were  kept  together  near 
the  sea,  without  proper  food,  or  raiment,  or  shelter, 
till  other  ships  came  to  take  them  away,  and  December, 
with  its  appalling  cold,  had  struck  the  shivering,  half- 
clad,  broken-hearted  sufferers,  before  the  last  of  them 
were  removed.  'The  embarkation  of  the  inhabitants 
goes  on  but  slowly,'  wrote  Monckton,  from  Fort  Cum- 
berland, near  which  he  had  burned  three  hamlets  ;  '  the 
most  part  of  the  wives  of  the  men  we  have  prisoners 
are  gone  off"  with  their  children,  in  hopes  I  would  not 
send  off  their  husbands  without  them.'  Their  hope 
was  vain.  Near  Annapolis  a  hundred  heads  of  fam- 
ilies fled  to  the  woods,  and  a  party  was  detached  on  the 
hunt  to  bring  them  in.  '  Our  soldiers  hate  them,'  wrote 
an  officei  on  this  occasion,  '  and  if  they  can  but  find  a 
pretence  to  kill  them,  they  will.'  Did  a  prisoner  seek 
to  escape  ?  He  was  shot  down  by  the  sentinel.  Yet 
tome  fled  to  Quebec  ;  more  than  3,000  had  withdrawn 
to  Miramichi,  and  the  region  south  of  the  Ristigcuche  ; 


some  found  rest  on  the  banks  of  the  St  John's  and  its 
branches  ;  some  found  a  lair  in  their  native  forests  ; 
some  were  charitably  sheltered  from  the  English  in  the 
wigwams  of  the  savages.  But  7,000  of  these  banished 
people  were  driven  on  board  ships,  and  scattered 
among  the  English  colonies,  from  New  Hampshire  to 
Georgia  ; — one  thousand  and  twenty  to  South  Carolina 
alone.  They  were  cast  ashore  without  resources  ;  hat- 
ing the  poorhouse  as  a  shelter  for  their  offspring,  and 
abhorring  the  thought  of  selling  them  as  laborers. 
Households  too  were  separated  ;  the  colonial  news- 
papers contained  advertisements  of  members  of  fami- 
lies seeking  their  companions,  of  sons  anxious  to  reach 
and  relieve  their  parents,  of  mothers  mourning  for  their 
children. 

The  wanderers  sighed  for  their  native  country ;  but, 
to  prevent  their  return,  their  villages,  from  Annapolis,  tc 
the  isthmus,  were  laid  waste.  Their  old  homes  were  but 
ruins.  In  the  district  of  Minas,  for  instance,  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  of  their  houses,  and  more  than  as  many 
barns,  were  consumed.  The  live  stock  which  belonged 
to  them,  consisting  of  great  numbers  of  horned  cattle, 
hogs,  sheep,  and  horses,  were  seized  as  spoils  and  dis- 
posed of  by  the  English  officials.  A  beautiful  and  fer- 
tile tract  of  country  was  reduced  to  a  solitude.  There 
was  none  left  round  the  ashes  of  the  cottages  of  the 
Acadians,  but  a  faithful  watch-dog,  vainly  seeking 
the  hands  that  fed  him.  Thickets  of  forest  trees  choked 
their  orchards  ;  the  ocean  broke  over  their  neglected 
dikes,  and  desolated  their  meadows. 

Relendess  misfortune  pursued  the  exiles  wherever 
they  fled.  Those  sent  to  Georgia,  drawn  by  a  love 
for  the  spot  where  they  were  born  as  strong  as  that  of 
the  captive  Jews,  who  wept  by  the  side  of  the  rivers  of 
Babylon  for  their  own  temple  and  land,  escaped  to  sea 
in  boats,  and  went  coasting  from  harbor  to  harbor  ;  but 
when  they  reached  New  England,  just  as  they  would 
have  set  sail  for  their  native  fields,  they  were  stopped 
by  orders  from  Nova  Scotia.  Those  who  dwelt  on  the 
St.  John's  were  torn  once  more  from  their  new  homes. 
When  Canada  surrendered,  hatred  with  its  worst  ve- 
nom pursued  the  fifteen  hundred  who  remained  south 
of  the  Ristigouche.  Once  those  who  dwelt  in  Pennsyl- 
vania presented  a  humble  petition  to  the  Earl  of  Lou- 
doun, then  the  British  commander-in-chief  in  America  ; 
and  the  cold-hearted  peer,  offended  that  the  prayer 
was  made  in  French,  seized  their  five  principal  men, 
who  in  their  own  land  had  been  persons  of  dignity  and 
substance,  and  shipped  them  to  England,  with  the  re- 
quest that  they  might  be  kept  from  ever  again  becom- 
ing troublesome,  by  being  consigned  to  service  as 
common  sailors  on  board  ships  of  war.  No  doubt  ex- 
isted of  the  king's  approbation.  The  Lords  of  Trade, 
more  merciless  than  the  savages  and  than  the  wilder- 
ness in  winter,  wished  very  much  that  every  one  of  the 
Acadians  should  be  driven  out ;  and  when  it  seemed 
that  the  work  was  done,  congratulated  the  king  that 
'  the  zealous  endeavors  of  Lawrence  had  been  crowned 
with  an  entire  success.'  I  know  not  if  the  annals  of 
the  human  race  keep  the  record  of  sorrows  so  wantonly 
inflicted,  so  bitter,  and  so  perennial,  as  fell  upon  the 
French  inhabitants  of  Acadia.  '  We  have  been  true,' 
said  they  of  themselves,  '  to  our  religion,  and  true  to 
ourselves  ;  yet  nature  appears  to  consider  us  only  as 
the  objects  of  public  vengeance.'  The  hand  of  the 
English  official  seemed  under  a  spell  with  regard  tc 
them  ;  and  was  never  uplifted  but  to  curse  them. — Ban 
croft,  vol.  iv.,  pp.  202-206. 


148  DEFEAT  AND , DEATH  OF   GEN.   BRADDOCK. 

may  have  known  about  the  art  of  war,  as  carried  on  in  Europe,  his  appoint- 
ment to  a  command  in  the  wilderness  was  most  unfortunate.  Impatient  of 
advice,  imperious  in  disposition,  rash  in  language,  and  with  no  winning  ways 
through  kindness  or  dignity,  he  inspired  little  respect  or  confidence  from  the 
two  thousand  men  he  started  with  from  Cumberland.  Knowing  something 
of  the  reputation  of  Colonel  Washington,  he  was  appointed  to  act  as  Aid  to 
the  commander-in-chief,  and  given  the  command  of  the  provincial  soldiers. 
He  pushed  on  with  twelve  hundred  men,  by  forced  marches,  leaving  Col. 
Dunbar  to  bring  up  the  rest  with  the  baggage  train.  Knowing  how  little 
Braddock  could  possibly  understand  of  the  only  successful  way  to  make  war 
in  the  wilderness,  Washington  modestly  proffered  his  advice  ;  but  the  obstinate 
and  fiery  Irishman  rejected  it  with  disdain.1  Pressing  his  march,  at  mid-day 
the  9th  day  of  July,  on  the  south  bank  of  the  Monongahela,  the  advance 
guard,  under  Col.  Gage, — afterwards  commander-in-chief  of  the  British  forces 
at  Boston,  in  the  beginning  of  the  Revolution, — was  surprised  by  a  cloud  of 
arrows,  and  a  volley  of  bullets,  from  a  ravine  in  a  thicket,  where  a  thousand 
Indians  lay  in  ambush.  Washington  saw  the  peril,  and  once  more  begged 
his  commander  to  retreat  for  a  while,  and  prepare  to  prosecute  the  battle  in 
a  better  way.  But  Braddock  was  as  destitute  of  common  sense  as  he  was  of 
personal  fear ;  and  without  judgment  he  fought  a  European  battle,  his  col- 
umns melting  away  in  the  useless  conflict  with  a  hidden  but  terrible  foe. 
Death  reigned  all  around.  Every  mounted  officer,  except  Washington,  was 
killed  or  wounded.  At  last  the  desperate  Braddock  himself  fell  mortally 
wounded,  after  having  had  several  horses  shot  under  him.8  For  three  hours 
the  Provincial  troops  had  been  fighting  with  much  useless  courage,  and  with 
the  full  knowledge  that  their  lives  were  being  needlessly  thrown  away.  They 
would  no  longer  keep  the  field ;  and  although  the  regulars  were  in  a  complete 
route  after  they  saw  their  General  fall,  yet  Washington  by  his  magic  power 
rallied  his  own  countrymen,  and  covered  the  whole  retreat  in  so  masterly  a 
manner  that  the  enemy  made  no  attempt  to  follow. 

Unfortunate  as  it  seemed  for  the  cause  of  the  colonists,  the  death  of 
Braddock  excited  little  regret.  It  was  afterwards  supposed  to  be  well  ascer- 
tained, that  he  was  shot  by  Thomas  Faucett,  a  Provincial  soldier,  whose  bro- 
ther having,  contrary  to  the  silly  order  of  the  commander,  protected  himself 
behind  a  tree,  had  been  struck  down  with  the  cleaving  sword  of  Braddock, 
who  dashed  up  to  him  when  he  discovered  his  position.  With  a  flash  from 
the  surviving  brother's  musket,  Braddock  reeled  from  his  saddle.  It  was 
at  that  moment  that  the  Provincials  were  saved  from  complete  slaughter 
by  everywhere  violating  the  order  of  the  British  General. 

1  '  The  opinion  in  the  provinces,'  Bancroft  remarks,  rifle  fifteen  times  during  the  battle  on  the  Monongahe- 
'  was  very  general  that  the  war  was  conducted  by  a  la,  without  hitting  him.  Washington  was  never 
mixture  of  ignorance  and  cowardice.  They  believed  wounded  in  battle.  On  this  occasion  he  had  two  horses 
that  they  were  able  to  defend  themselves  against  the  shot  under  him,  and  four  bullets  passed  through  hi* 
French,  without  any  assistance  or  embarrassments  coat.  Writing  of  this  to  his  brother,  he  remarked,  '  By 
from  England  '  the  all-powerful  dispensations  of  Providence,   I  hav« 

2  Dr.  Craik,  who  was  with  Washington  at  this  time,  been  protected  beyond  all  human  probability  or  expeo» 
and  also  attended  him  in  his  last  illness,  says,  that  tation,  ....  although  death  was  It  veiling  my 
while  in  the  Ohioco.intry  with  him,  fifteen  years  after-  companions  on  every  side.'— Hist,  of  the  U.  S.  p.  18^ 
•ards,  an  old  Ind  an  chief  came,  as  he  said,  '  a  long  Note, 

way'  to  see  the  Viiginia  Colonel  at  whom  he  fired  his 


GEN.    JOHNSON'S  EXI EDITION  TO  LAKE   GEORGE.       149 

BraddocK  s  Burial,  July  15,  1755. — Washington  had  recovered  the  body 
of  Braddock,  and  a  week  after  the  battle  he  read  over  the  corpse,  by  torch- 
light, the  solemn  service  of  the  Church  of  England.  The  grave  where  his 
ashes  repose  can  be  seen  to  this  day,  near  the  National  road,  between  the 
53d  and  54th  mile  from  Cumberland. 

The  chief  portion  of  the  shattered  remains  of  the  fugitive  battalions  were 
marched  back  to  Pennsylvania .  by  Col.  Dunbar,  while  Washington  led  the 
rest  home  to  Virginia. 

Shirley's  Expedition  to  Niagara. — The  month  of  August  had  nearly  worn 
away  before  Shirley,  with  his  twenty- five  hundred  men,  reached  Oswego. 
From  that  point  he  was  to  transport  his  troops  by  water  to  Niagara.  But 
the  storms  of  the  late  season,  alarming  disease  in  his  camp,  and  the  desertion 
of  his  Iroquois,  and  the  Stockbridge  Indians  from  the  Housatonic,  compelled 
him  to  abandon  his  plan ;  and  leaving  a  small  force  to  complete  and  garrison 
the  fort  he  had  begun,  he  marched  the  rest  of  his  forces  back  to  Massachu- 
setts. 

Gen.  Johnson's  Expedition. — It  was  by  far  the  largest  and  best  managed 
of  all ;  and  although  it  failed  in  its  chief  object,  it  effectually  revealed  the 
strength  of  the  contending  parties,  and  opened  up  some  of  the  most  tragic 
scenes  of  the  war.  Six  thousand  of  the  troops  of  New  England,  New  Jersey, 
and  New  York  had  gathered  on  the  Hudson,  fifty  miles  above  Albany,  under 
the  command  of  Gen.  Lyman,  of  Connecticut.  Strong  works  had  been  con- 
structed, which  afterward  took  the  name  of  Fort  Edward.  It  was  the  most 
formidable  expedition  that  had  ever  been  seen  on  this  continent.  In  August 
Gen.  Johnson  reached  the  camp,  and  marched  to  the  head  of  Lake  George, 
a  distance  of  fifteen  miles,  where  he  established  his  headquarters,  and  pre- 
pared to  open  the  campaign.  Baron  Dieskau,  a  French  general  of  reputa- 
tion, was,  in  the  meantime,  advancing  from  Montreal,  by  way  of  Lake  Cham- 
plain,  with  two  thousand  Canadian  militia  and  Indian  allies.  He  landed  his 
forces  at  Whitehall,  with  the  intention  of  assaulting  Fort  Edward ;  but  the 
sight  of  British  cannon  terrified  the  Indians,  and  he  marched  at  once  to  attack 
Johnson  on  Lake  George.  The  scouts  bringing  in  the  news  of  the  approach 
of  the  French,  Johnson  sent  Col.  Ephraim  Williams,1  of  Massachusetts,  with 
a  thousand  of  the  troops  of  that  colony,  and  two  hundred  Mohawks,  led  by 
their  terrible  chief,  Hendrick,  to  cut  off  the  advance  of  the  enemy.  They 
met  in  a  narrow  defile,  four  miles  to  the  south  of  the  lake.  But  while  Wil- 
liams was  confidently  advancing,  he  suddenly  found  himself  in  an  ambuscade 
which  threatened  a  general  massacre.  The  enemy  sprang  upon  them  from 
every  side.  Williams  and  Hendrick  were  both  killed.  Nothing  but  the 
desperate  valor  of  the  Massachusetts  men  under  Col.  Timothy  Ruggles — 

1  While  on   his   way  north,  Williams   stopped   at  on  the  right  side  of  the  road  from  Glenn's  Falls  to 

Albany,  made  his  will,  and  bequeathed  certain  property  Lake  George,  still  bears  his  name  ;  and  a  col'ection  oi 

to  found  a  free  school  for  western  Massachusetts.  This  water  on  the  battle-ground  is  called  Bloody  Pond.— 

was   the   foundation  of  '  Williams  College,'  his    best  Lossing's  Hist,  of  the  U.  S.  p.  xyo—Note. 
monument.     The  rock  near  which  his  body  was  found, 
IO 


15°        WAR  FORMALLY  PROCLAIMED  AGAINST  FRANCE. 

afterwards  president  of  the  Stamp  Act  Congress,  held  in  New  York — and  the 
coolness  of  Nathan  Whiting,  of  New  Haven,  saved  the  little  army  from  de- 
struction. It  was  a  flight  back  to  the  lake,  where  the  French  followed  up 
their  success  by  a  gallant  assault.  But  to  their  dismay  the  heavy  ordnance 
which  Johnson  had  already  mounted  upon  breastworks  of  logs,  opened 
upon  them  a  deadly  fire.  Dieskau  was  disabled  by  dangerous  wounds,  and 
the  Indians  fled  with  wild  shrieks  in  terror  to  the  woods.  But  the  French 
troops  still  maintained  the  conflict  with  desperate  courage,  until  the  fall  of 
their  commander,  when  they  were  forced  to  retreat  towards  Crown  Point, 
The  arrival  of  Gen.  Lyman  with  reinforcements  from  Fort  Edward  ended 
the  conflict.  The  baggage  fell  into  the  hands  of  a  detachment  of  New  Hamp- 
shire troops,  and  the  victory  was  complete.1 

Close  of  the  Campaign  of  1755. — Gen.  Johnson  was  content  with  his 
victory.  On  the  site  of  his  camp  he  constructed  Fort  William  Henry,  which 
he  garrisoned  as  well  as  Fort  Edward.  Returning  to  Albany,  he  disbanded  the 
main  body  of  his  troops.  The  credit  of  the  victory  clearly  belonged  to  Gen. 
Lyman  ;  but  no  allusion  to  his  gallant  conduct  was  made  in  the  despatches  of 
his  superior  officer,  who,  through  the  representation  of  his  friends  at  London, 
had  the  honor  of  knighthood  bestowed  upon  him,  with  a  considerable  sum 
of  money.  Thus  ended  the  last  campaign  of  the  second  year  of  the  French 
and  Indian  War. 

War  Formally  Proclaimed  against  France,  May  17,  1756. — The  Cam- 
paign of  that  Year. — England  now  began  to  prosecute  the  war  in  America 
with  greater  vigor.  At  a  convention  of  the  colonial  Governors  held  at 
Albany,  the  campaign  for  the  year  had  been  arranged  in  the  early  spring. 
Gen.  Johnson's  retirement  from  the  field  so  early  the  year  before,  had  left 
the  French  fair  opportunities  to  fortify  Crown  Point,  and  it  was  determined 
to  send  an  expedition  of  ten  thousand  men  to  attack  it.  Six  thousand 
were  to  be  led  against  Niagara,  and  three  thousand  were  to  march  against  Fort 
Duquesne ;  while  two  thousand  were  to  be  sent  beyond  the  Kennebec 
to  destroy  the  settlements  on  the  Chaudiere  river.  Success  would  most 
likely  have  attended  the  expedition  against  Crown  Point,  which  was  in- 
trusted to  Gen.  Winslow,  who  had  already  collected  seven  thousand  men 
at  Albany,  had  not  Abercrombie,  the  Acting  General-in-Chief,  arrived,  and 
by  injudicious  interferences  caused  so  much  delay  that  the  French  had  time 

1  Dieskau  was  found  mortally  wounded,  carried  was  on  horseback,  was  killed  on  the  spot :  Williams 
into  the  English  camp,  and  there  tenderly  treated.  He  also  fell ;  but  Nathan  Whiting,  of  New  Haven,  con- 
was  afterwards  conveyed  to  New  York,  from  whence  ducted  the  retreat  in  good  order,  often  rallying  and 
he  sailed  to  England,  where  he  died. — Lossing's  Hist,  turning  to  fire.' 

of  the  U.  S.,  p.  190 — Note.  In  a  skirmish,  Putnam,  with  twelve  or  fourteen  of  a 
John  Stark  was  with  Johnson's  army  in  the  cam-  little  party,  got  separated  and  taken  prisoner  by  the  I  n- 
paignofi7S5.  Bancroft  says  of  him  :  '  Then  a  lieuten-  dians  ;  his  comrades  were  scalped.  '  In  after  life  he 
ant  of  a  rugged  nature,  but  of  the  coolest  judgment,  used  to  relate  how  one  of  the  savages  gashed  his  cheek 
skilled  at  discovering  the  paths  of  the  wilderness,  and  with  a  tomahawk,  bound  him  to  a  forest  tree,  and  kin- 
knowing  the  ways  to  the  hearts  of  the  backwoodsmen  died  about  him  a  crackling  fire  ;  but  his  thoughts  glanced 
.  .  .  .  And  Israel  Putnam,  to  whom,  at  the  age  of  aside  to  the  wife  of  his  youth  and  the  group  of  children 
thirtvseven,  the  Assembly  of  Connecticut  had  just  that  gambolled  in  his  field ;  when  the  French  officer, 
givei.  the  rank  of  second  lieutenant.  .  .  .  The  Marin»  happening  to  descry  his  danger,  rescued  hia 
great-hearted  chieftain,  Hendrick,  famed  for  his  clear  from  death,  to  be  exchanged  in  the  autumn.' 
voice  and  flashing  eye.     .     .     .     Hendrick,  who  alone 


MONTCALM   VICTORIOUS  AT  THE  NORTH.  15 J 

to  make  preparations  formidable  enough  to  disconcert  the  plan  of  ths  whole 
campaign. 

Meantime  the  Marquis  de  Montcalm,  who  had  succeeded  Baron  Dieskau 
as  commander  of  the  French  troops  in  Canada,  taking  advantage  of  this 
delay,  crossed  Lake  Ontario  with  a  force  of  five  thousand  French  troops — 
Canadians,  militia,  and  Indian  allies,  with  thirty  pieces  of  cannon — and  landed 
only  a  few  miles  below  Oswego.  Fort  Ontario  was  too  weak  to  be  defended, 
and  Col.  Mercer  withdrew  to  stronger  fortifications  across  the  river.  A 
gallant  defence  was  made;  but  Mercer  was  killed,  and  the  garrison  of 
fourteen  hundred  men  surrendered.  All  the  provisions,  ammunition,  and 
armament,  consisting  of  a  hundred  and  thirty-four  pieces  of  cannon,  with' 
all  the  vessels  in  the  harbor,  fell  into  the  hands  of  Montcalm.  This  terrible 
blow  paralyzed  all  further  British  and  colonial  movements  for  the  season. 
The  fortifications  at  Oswego  were  destroyed.  In  their  comparative  help- 
lessness, the  Six  Nations  were  forced  into  a  treaty  of  neutrality,  and  when 
the  campaign  ended,  the  French  had  every  reason  for  congratulation. 

Another  of  the  blunders  of  the  British  ministry  had  been  the  appoint- 
ment the  year  before  of  Lord  Loudoun,  not  only  as  Governor  of  Virginia, 
against  the  wishes  of  the  people,  but  as  Commander-in-Chief.  His  ignorance 
and  inefficiency  had  already  proved  disastrous  enough  ;  but  they  were  to 
work  still  more  fatally.  Leaving  Lake  Champlain  and  the  whole  Canadian 
frontier  in  undisturbed  possession  of  the  French,  he  decided  to  limit  the 
campaign  of  1757  to  the  capture  of  Louisburg.  Although  the  folly  of  the 
plan  was  apparent,  yet  the  patriotism  of  New  England  gave  him  six  thousand 
troops  by  the  first  of  June.  He  sailed  for  Halifax,  where  he  was  joined  bv 
the  fleet  of  Admiral  Holborne,  who,  in  addition  to  a  powerful  naval  arma- 
ment, brought  with  him  five  thousand  regular  troops  of  the  British  army. 
But  before  the  expedition  had  set  out  for  Cape  Breton,  six  thousand  troops 
had  reinforced  the  fortress  at  Louisburg,  and  a  fleet  still  larger  than  the 
English  was  anchored  under  its  guns  in  the  harbor.  The  expedition  thus 
terminated  in  disgrace. 

A  brave  though  tardy  effort  had  been  made  to  hold  Lake  George  and  its 
approaches.  Col.  Munroe,  a  gallant  English  officer,  with  a  garrison  of  three 
thousand  men,  commanded  Fort  William  Henry  j  while  Fort  Edward  was  held 
by  a  still  larger  force,  under  Gen.  Webb.  But  through  the  inefficiency  of  the 
latter  commander,  and  his  delay  in  sending  aid  to  Col.  Munroe,  who  was  now 
closely  besieged  by  Montcalm,  the  commander  of  Lake  George  fortress,  after 
a  brave  defence  of  six  days,  maintained  with  such  valor  as  to  command  the 
admiration  of  the  French  General,  and  under  the  advice  of  Webb,  who  furnished 
him  no  relief — had  to  surrender.  Montcalm  had  tendered  honorable  terms  of 
capitulation,  with  a  pledge  of  safe  escort  to  Fort  Edward.  But  before  Mun- 
roe's  troops  had  marched  one  mile  on  their  way,  the  two  thousand  savages 
under  Montcalm,  pursued  them  with  slaughter,  till  they  came  within  range  of 


152  FATAL  POLICY  OF  THE  BRITISH  MINISTRY. 

the  guns  of  Fort  Edward.  Montcalm  afterwards  solemnly  declared  that  it  was 
utterly  beyond  his  power  to  restrain  his  Indian  allies  ;  and  most  likely  he 
told  the  truth.  So  much  the  worse  for  the  atrocious  policy  which  invoked 
such  infernal  alliances  of  savages  by  the  belligerents  on  either  side  ! 

While  the  Indians  were  engaged  in  that  bloody  work,  Montcalm  proceeded 
to  lay  Fort  William  Henry  in  ashes  ;  and  those  seared  mounds  and  charred 
timbers  lay  undisturbed  till  1854,  when  a  beautiful  summer  hotel,  erected  by 
the  enterprising  citizens  of  the  neighboring  village  of*  Caldwell,  rose  over  the 
ruins. 

The-  Campaign  of  1758. — The  imperial  spirit  of  British  domination, 
which  during  the  last  century  so  paralyzed  the  power  of  the  Thirteen 
Colonies,  and  which  retarded  the  growth  of  the  whole  colonial  system  of 
Great  Britain  throughout  the  world,  yielded  to  no  enlightened  policy  here, 
however  fatal  were  the  results  which  attended  it.  The  British  ministry  did 
not  understand  how  strong  were  the  elements  of  independence  which  per- 
vaded the  colonies  ;  nor  how  sturdy  their  manhood,  nurtured  under  such  hardy 
training.  They  knew  little  of  the  political  wisdom  displayed  by  these  found- 
ers of  States — how  deep  had  been  their  studies  of  government ;  how  patient 
their  investigations  in  political  science ;  how  thoroughly  they  understood  the 
laws  of  political  growth  and  organization.  Least  of  all  did  the  statesmen  of 
England  comprehend  the  means  by  which  a  complete  union  of  the  colonies 
could  be  effected  for  prosecuting  the  struggle  against  France.  The  civil  and 
military  officers  sent  to  the  colonies  came  with  preconceived  notions,  which 
would  not  yield  to  new  facts.  They  could  not  learn  from  experience,  until 
the  time  for  the  lesson  had  passed.  While  Braddock  lay  dying,  after  Wash- 
ington's consummate  retreat,  expressions  of  unavailing  regret  often  fell  from  his 
lips  ;  and  in  all  subsequent  time,  a  review  of  the  fatal  errors  which  were  com- 
mitted by  the  ministry,  by  the  Parliament,  the  civil  governors  and  command- 
ers sent  over  to  the  colonies,  confirm  the  folly  of  the  one  side,  and  the 
wisdom  of  the  other.  Even  in  civil  affairs,  the  statesmen  of  America  showed 
themselves  as  far  superior  to  the  British  rulers,  as  our  own  generals  proved 
themselves  during  the  French  War,  to  the  generals  of  the  British  army,  when 
fighting  in  their  new  fields. 

The  disasters  which  had  already  attended  the  two  previous  campaigns, 
might  now  have  been  atoned  for,  if  the  advice  of  the  strong  men  of  the 
colonies  could  have  prevailed.  At  that  time  Benjamin  Franklin,  and  other 
great  men  who  alone  were  capable  of  managing  affairs,  saw  just  how  things 
stood;  but  their  suggestions  were  unheeded — no  protest,  argument,  or  im- 
ploration  availed.  If  they  could  have  had  their  way,  they  would  have  ended 
the   French  war  in  a  few  months. '     There  was  material  enough  of  all  sorts — 

1  •  Oh,  that  we  had  nothing  to  do  with  Great  Bri-  at  the  record  of  the  war  of  the  Revolution,  where  the 

tain  forever ' — was  then  the  wish  of  John  Adams,  in  English   still  followed   out   the  same  ideas   they  had 

his  heart,  fis  he  said  in  a  letter  to  Otis.  practised  in  the  French  War,  and  where  just  as  often 

To   show  h  v  much  better  our   continental  officers  they  got  the  worst  of  it. 
could  fight  an  American  battle,  than  the  English,  look 


PITT  CALLED  TO  THE  HEAD  OF  THE  EMPIRE.  153 

men — munitions  of  war — military  talent — knowledge  of  the  country — clear- 
ness of  vision — ripeness  of  judgment — sound  common  sense,  to  have  done 
the  work.  But  all  these  resources  were  rendered  ineffectual.  Imperial 
orders  must  be  obeyed,  whatever  the  cost.  British  rapacity  and  pride,  British 
incompetency  and  ignorance,  had  full  sway. 

But  the  merits  of  the  case  were  beginning  to  be  understood  in  England. 
The  intelligent  classes  there  were  now  doing  their  own  thinking.  The  power 
of  the  throne  was  growing  weak ;  the  independence  of  Parliament  was  being 
established.  An  uninterrupted  correspondence  had  been  long  going  on  be- 
tween the  enlightened  and  liberal-minded  men  of  the  British  Islands  and  the 
colonists ;  and  although  they  had  no  representation  in  the  legislature  of  Great 
Britain,  they  made  their  influence  felt.  The  imperious  but  imbecile  ministry 
had  to  give  way,  and  William  Pitt  was  called  to  power — June,  1757. 

Better  judgment  now  ruled,  and  more  vigorous  measures  adopted.  What- 
ever was  to  be  done  hereafter,  would  be  attended  with  some  decisive  results. 
The  great  minister  saw  the  remedy,  and  adopted  the  first  means  in  his  power 
to  atone  for  the  blunders  of  his  predecessors.  Lord  Loudoun's  character  had 
been  well  described  by  Dr.  Franklin,  who  said  that,  '  Like  St.  George  on  the 
signs,  he  was  always  on  horseback,  but  never  rode  forward.'  This  incompe- 
tent commander  was  recalled,  and  Gen.  Abercrombie  appointed  his  successor. 
Admiral  Boscawen  sailed  with  a  strong  naval  armament,  and  twelve  thousand 
efficient  troops.  The  minister  addressed  a  generous  letter  to  the  colonies, 
asking  them  to  raise  and  clothe  twenty  thousand  men,  pledging  to  furnish 
them  provisions,  tents,  and  arms,  while  all  the  money  advanced  by  the  colo- 
nists in  this  cause  should  be  returned.  This  appeal  produced  a  magical  effect. 
New  England  at  once  raised  15,000  men;  New  York  2,700;  New  Jersey 
1,000 ;  Pennsylvania  3,000  ;  and  Virginia  2,000.  The  other  colonies  did 
their  share.  Taxes  were  everywhere  freely  imposed.  Those  laid  on  real 
estate  in  Massachusetts,  particularly,  exceeded  half  the  income  of  the  pro- 
prietors. But  being  done  by  their  own  representatives  in  the  colonial  legis- 
lature, it  was  done  cheerfully  ;  while  a  trifling  tax  afterwards  laid  upon  tea, 
without  their  consent,  began  a  revolution. 

May,  1758. — Early  in  the  following  May,  when  Gen.  Abercrombie  took 
command,  he  found  fifty  thousand  men  ready  for  the  campaign  ;  a  force  so 
disproportioned  to  the  French,  that  they  outnumbered  the  entire  male  French 
population  on  the  continent ;  for  the  best  authorities  did  not  at  this  time  cred- 
it the  entire  number  of  the  male  population  of  Canada,  capable  of  bearing 
arms,  at  more  than  twenty  thousand ;  and  one-quarter  of  these  were  regular 
French  troops — force  enough,  under  proper  management,  to  have  extin- 
guished the  French  power  in  twelve  months. 

Surrender  of  Louisburg,  Cape  Breton,  and  St.  John,  July  26,  1758. — The 
2ampaign  of  1758  was  well  conceived.  Louisburg,  Ticonderoga,  and  Foit 
Duquesne,  were  the  strong  points  to  be  assailed.     Admiral  Boscawen's  fleet 


154  THE  RENDEZVOUS   ON  LAKE   GEORGE. 

of  forty  armed  vessels,  transporting  more  than  twelve  thousand  men,  uniei 
the  command  of  Gen.  Amherst,  and  Wolfe,  his  lieutenant,  entered  Gabarus 
Bay.  Landing  his  troops,  he  commenced  an  attack  from  the  shore,  and  a 
bombardment  of  the  fortress  from  the  fleet.  Whatever  there  is  of  splendor 
in  land  or  naval  warfare  was  seen  there.  The  siege  and  bombardment 
lasted  fifty  days,  before  the  heroic  defenders  of  Louisburg  struck  their  colors. 
If  the  scope  of  this  work  admitted,  I  should  yield  to  the  fascination,  and  at- 
tempt some  description  of  this  memorable  siege ;  but  the  record  has  often 
enough  been  made  in  history,  and  it  has  embellished  the  pages  of  romance ; 
— the  stream  must  bear  us  on.  Five  thousand  prisoners,  and  all  their  mili- 
tary stores,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  victor,  and  the  first  heavy  blow  of  Eng- 
lish valor  had  fallen  on  the  doomed  French  power  in  North  America. 

Montcalm  at  Ticonderoga. — Heavier  work,  however,  than  besieging  a 
fortress  was  now  to  be  done.  The  chief  interest  of  the  struggle  centred 
around  Ticonderoga, — there  the  expectations  and  fortunes  of  both  parties 
were  clustering.  The  brilliant  and  experienced  Montcalm  held  Ticonderoga, 
with  four  thousand  men,  and  nothing  had  been  neglected  to  strengthen  the 
position.  Abercrombie  had  reached  Lake  George  with  seven  thousand  regu- 
lars, nine  thousand  Provincials,  and  a  heavy  train  of  effective  artillery.  He  had 
a  lieutenant  than  whom  England  could  furnish  no  one  of  his  age  more  able  and 
gallant.  Lord  Howe,  the  younger  brother  of  the  Admiral  of  the  same  name, — 
who  in  1 776-1 777  commanded  the  British  fleet  on  the  American  coast  in  the 
early  period  of  the  Revolution, — and  also  of  Sir  William  Howe,  the  commander 
of  the  land  forces, — had  only  reached  the  age  of  thirty-four.  Enthusiastic 
love  and  perfect  discipline  marked  the  command  of  his  troops.  No  cloud 
seemed  to  hang  over  so  well-appointed  and  formidable  an  expedition. 

The  Rendezvous  on  Lake  George,  July  5,  1758. — It  was  one  of  those 
balmy  summer  days,  when  our  climate  seems  to  find  its  paradise  on  the 
magical  shores  of  Lake  George,  where  the  deep  blue  of  the  northern  heavens 
is  softened  into  Italian  loveliness  by  the  blending  of  purple  and  gold  in 
the  western  heavens  at  sunset.  The  lake  stretches  away  to  the  north,  and 
on  its  bosom  without  a  ripple,  rest  the  pictures  of  the  mountains  so  perfectly 
photographed,  that  the  eye  can  hardly  discern  the  almost  invisible  line  that 
divides  one  landscape  from  the  other. 

On  the  morning  of  the  5th  of  July,  at  daybreak,  the  whole  armament,  car- 
rying more  than  fifteen  thousand  men,  in  nine  hundred  small-boats,  and  one 
hundred  and  thirty-five  whale-boats,  with  their  artillery  mounted  on  rafts, 
embarked  for  Ticonderoga.  It  was  the  largest  body  of  troops  ever  assembled 
in  the  hemisphere.  It  was  a  gala  spectacle.  Numberless  banners  streamed 
over  the  broad  flotilla,  flashing  with  brilliant  uniforms,  and  gay  with  exulta- 
tion ;  while  strains  of  martial  music  rolled  over  the  bosom  of  the  silver  lake, 
to  lose  themselves  in  their  own  echoes  among  the  neighboring  mountains. 
'  They  passed  over  the  broader  expanse  of  waters  to  the  first  narrows ;  they 


ABER  CR  OMB IPS  DEFEA  T—DEA  TH  OF  HO  WE.  1 5  5 

came  where  the  mountains,  then  mantled  with  forests,  step  down  to  tha 
water's  edge  ;  and  in  the  richest  hues  of  evening  light  they  halted  at  Sabbath 
Day  Point.  Long  afterwards  Stark  remembered  that  on  that  night  Howe, 
reclining  in  his  tent  on  a  bear-skin,  and  bent  on  winning  a  hero's  name, 
questioned  him  closely  as  to  the  position  of  Ticonderoga,  and  the  fittest  mode 
of  conducting  the  attack.'  ■ 

Reaching  the  foot  of  the  lake  the  next  day,  a  strong  detachment  under 
Howe  advanced  with  incompetent  guides  through  a  vast  tangled  morass, 
which  seemed  to  be  the  only  mode  of  reaching  the  stronghold  of  the  French 
at  Ticonderoga — a  distance  of  four  miles.  In  the  passage,  they  were  surprised 
by  an  attack  from  a  strong  scouting  party  which  Montcalm,  cognizant  of  all 
their  movements,  had  posted  to  dispute  their  advance.  A  desperate  and  vic- 
torious struggle  followed,  but  it  was  at  the  terrible  sacrifice  of  the  loss  of  the 
young  British  commander.  The  victorious  party  had  to  fall  back  to  the  land- 
ing-place, where  Abercrombie,  learning  that  a  strong  force  under  Montcalm 
was  advancing  to  protect  the  fort,  hastily  pressed  forward  with  the  main  body 
of  his  troops,  leaving  his  artillery  behind  him.  In  the  face  of  the  enemy's 
fire,  Abercrombie  gave  orders  for  his  troops  to  attack  and  scale  the  fort,  in 
the  old  style  of  British  valor.  A  brave  but  ineffectual  struggle  of  four  hours 
followed,  in  which  even  the  courage  of  his  men  proved  of  no  avail  against 
Montcalm's  impregnable  position  ;  and  the  attacking  army  was  obliged  to 
fall  back  to  the  ground  they  had  held  that  morning,  leaving  two  thousand  of 
the  best  troops  dead,  or  helpless  from  their  wounds,  in  the  deep  gloom  of  the 
morass,  which  was  overshadowed  by  a  dense  and  lofty  forest. 

Once  more  this  consummate  French  commander,  by  his  superior  strategy' 
and  vigilance,  wrested  victory  from  his  assailants,  who  far  outnumbered  him. 

Slowly  the  shattered  expedition  retraced  its  way  over  the  calm  lake,  where 
the  vanquished  leader  sat  down  in  despondency,  overwhelmed  by  the  great- 
ness of  his  disaster.  His  camp,  however,  was  filled  with  brave  spirits,  who 
could  no  longer  brook  this  supine  inactivity.  The  British  standard  was  still 
floating  over  an  encampment  of  upwards  of  twelve  thousand  men,  hundreds 
of  them  gallant  young  soldiers,  who,  during  the  rest  of  this  campaign,  and 
through  the  toils  of  the  coming  Revolution,  were,  on  both  sides  of  the 
struggle,  to  win  imperishable  fame.  There  were  Israel  Putnam,  and  Stark, 
Philip  Schuyler,  Charles  Lee,  Ward,  Pomeroy,  Gridley,  and  Nathaniel  Wood- 
hull — who  was  to  win  such  reputation  in  the  Revolution  at  the  time  of 
Washington's  retreat  from  Long  Island — and  hundreds  of  others  who  were  tak- 
ing those  great  lessons  in  war,  which  were  too  well  learned  in  this  school  of 
discipline  and  valor  ever  to  be  fogrotten. 

Among  them  was  Col.  Bradstreet,  who  after  earnest  solicitation  pre- 
vailed upon  Abercombie  to  give  him  a  detachment  of  three  thousand  men, 
to  march  against  Frontenac.  He  reached  Oswego,  and  crossing  Lake 
Ontario,  all  his  movements  being  characterized  by  celerity,  he  landed,  and 
two  days  later — August  27,  1758 — he  had  captured  the  fort,  the  garrison,  and 

1  Bancroft,  voL  iv.,  p.  999. 


156  THE   CAPTURE   OF  FORT  DUQUESNE. 

all  the  shipping  in  the  harbor.  Till  the  moment  of  triumph,  he  had  lost  but 
four  men.  He  had  made  eight  hundred  prisoners,  and  in  the  spoils  he 
reckoned  nine  armed  vessels,  sixty  cannon,  sixteen  mortars,  and  large 
quantities  of  ammunitions  and  stores  of  goods  for  traffic  with  the  Indians. 
After  this  brilliant  achievement,  in  spite  of  the  loss  of  five  hundred  men  by 
the  prevalence  of  a  fearful  disease  which  broke  out  in  his  camp,  he  reached 
the  spot  where  Rome  now  stands,  and  built  Fort  Stanwix,  which  was  to 
become  so  important  a  post  during  the  Revolution. 

The  fourth  expedition  in  this  campaign  of  1758  was  intrusted  to  Gen. 
John  Forbes  against  Fort  Duquesne.  It  consisted  of  nine  thousand  men, 
when  it  marched  from  Fort  Cumberland  and  Raystown, — the  most  effective, 
because  the  best  managed  portion  being  the  Virginia  troops  under  Col. 
Washington.  Once  more  incapacity  well-nigh  defeated  the  object  of  the 
expedition.  Against  the  earnest  advice  of  Washington,  Forbes,  who  seemed 
to  be  in  the  interest  of  certain  Pennsylvania  land  speculators,  persisted  in 
constructing  a  new  road  across  the  mountains,  instead  of  taking  the  old  and 
easy  track  left  by  Braddock.  This  caused  a  delay  that  nearly  proved  fatal ; 
for  before  Forbes,  with  his  six  thousand  troops,  had  crossed  the  Alleghanies, 
the  French  had  reinforced  Fort  Duquesne  by  about  a  thousand  men.  Delay 
had  eaten  up  the  days  until  the  8th  of  November,  before  any  decisive  step 
had  been  taken.  But  from  prisoners  it  was  ascertained  that  Fort  Duquesne 
was  not  strong  enough  to  offer  any  effectual  resistance  to  so  overpowering  a 
force  ;  and  yet  the  timid  Forbes  had  induced  the  Council  of  War  to  decide 
on  abandoning  the  enterprise  altogether.  For  once  the  counsels  of  Wash- 
ington were  heeded.  He  was  allowed  to  advance  with  a  strong  detachment, 
to  be  followed  by  the  whole  army.  Knowing  the  ground  so  well,  and  in- 
spiring the  troops  with  his  own  indomitable  courage,  he  pressed  on,  when  he 
found  that  the  day  before,  on  the  news  of  his  approach,  the  French  com- 
mander had  abandoned  the  fort,  and  razed  it  to  the  ground,  destroying  all 
else  he  could.  The  American  army  marched  in,  and  the  British  standard  was 
run  up ;  while  a  new  consecration  was  given  to  the  conquered  ground  by 
calling  it  Fort  Pitt,  around  which  afterwards  rose  the  great  city  of  Pittsburg.1 

1  By  a  series  of  wonderful  marches,  and  overcoming  '  These  dreary   deserts,'  wrote  Forbes,  '  will  soon  be 

obstacles  too  numerous  and  vast  for  us  to  form  any  ade-  the  richest  and  most  fertile  of  any  possessed  by  the 

quate  conception  of,  Washington,  on  the  25th  of  Novem-  British  in  North  America.' 
ber,  1758,  pointed  out  to  Armstrong  the  meeting  of  the 

two  rivers.     The  commander-in-chief,    with   his   own  While  Armstrong  had  been  preparing  that  expedi- 

hand,  raised  the  British  flag  over  the  ruined  bastions  of  tion   whose   success  was  due   chiefly  to   Washington. 

the  fortress.  'As  the  banners  of  England  floated  over  the  young  Benjamin  West,  and  Anthony  Wayne,  then  only 

waters,'  says  Bancroft,  '  the  place,  at  the  suggestion  of  a  boy   of  thirteen,  carried  away  by  the  enthusiasm  of 

Forbes,  was  with  one  voice  called  Pittsburg.     It  is  the  patriotic  feeling,   had   volunteered.     Three  years  had 

most  enduring  monument  to  William  Pitt.     America  now  gone   by  since   Braddock's   dreadful  defeat,  and 

raised   to   his  name  statues  that  have  been  wrongfully  soon   after   Pittsburg   was    taken  a  strong  detachment 

broken,  and  granite  piles  of  which  not  one  stone  re-  went   to   see   the   field   where  Braddock's  slaughtered 

mains  upon  another  ;  but,  long  as  the  Monongahela  and  men  still  lay.     '  Here  and  there,'    continues  Brancroft, 

the  Alleghany  shall  flow  to  form  the  Ohio,  long  as  the  'a  skeleton   was  found,  resting  on  the  trunk  of  a  fallen 

English  tongue  shall  be  the  language  of  freedom  in  the  tree,  as   if  a  wounded    man  had  sunk  down  in  the  at- 

boundless  valley  which  their  waters  traverse,  his  name  tempt   to   fly.     In    some   places  wolves  and  crows  had 

Bhall  stand  inscribed  on  the  gateway  of  the  west.'  left   signs  of  their  ravages  ;  in  others,  the  blackness  of 

The  twenty-sixth  was  observed  as  a  day  of  thanks-  ashes    marked    the    scene  of  the  revelry  of  cannibals, 

givrug   for  success,  and  when  was  success  of  greater  The  trees  still  showed  branches  rent  by  cannon  ;  trunks 

importance?     The  connection  between  the  seaside  and  dotted  with  musket  balls.     Where  the  havoc  had  been 

the  world  beyond    the  mountains  was  established  for-  the  fiercest,  bones  lay  whitening  in  confusion.       None 

ever  ;  •*  vast   territory  was  secured  ;   the  civilization  of  could   be  recognized,  except   that  the  son  of  Sir  Pete* 

liberty  and   commerce  an  A   religion  was  henceforth  to  Halket  was  called  by  the  shrill  whistle  of  a  savage  to  the 

maintain     the    undisputed  j-ossesssion  of   the   Ohio,  great  tree  near  which  his  father  and  his  brother  had 


PITTS  NOBLE   CONDUCT  TOWARDS   THE   COLONIES.     157 

This  last  expedition,  which,  but  for  Washington,  would  have  proved  a 
humiliating  failure,  broke  the  chain  of  connections  which  the  French  held  be- 
tween the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  It  liberated  the  whole  western 
frontier  from  the  domination  of  the  French,  and  the  terror  of  the  great  Indian 
tribes  which,  stretching  along  for  so  vast  a  distance,  had  either  been  won  over 
to  the  French,  or  been  made  to  falter  in  their  friendship  for  the  colonies.  It 
may  be  doubted  if,  during  the  wonderful  achievements  of  Washington  in  the 
Revolution,  he  rendered  at  any  one  time  a  more  substantial  service  to  the 
nation,  than  at  this  period.  Certain  it  is,  that  his  conduct  stamped  his  charac- 
ter then,  and  secured  his  fame  with  the  country.  Of  all  the  military  men  who 
had  thus  far  appeared  on  the  continent,  no  one  had  displayed  such  extraordi- 
nary qualities. 

The  Campaign  of  1759. — pitt  na(*  studied  the  whole  American  question, 
and  he  comprehended  perfectly  the  business  to  be  done.  Jle  determined  by 
one  bold  stroke  to  rescue  Canada  from  France,  and  wipe  out  her  power  in 
North  America  forever.  '  The  English  colonists,'  said  he,  '  and  their  de- 
scendants, can  never  be  a  great  people — they  can  never  be  a  useful  and  pow- 
erful ally  of  the  Empire,  until  the  French  are  driven  from  the  continent.' 

Every  means  of  information  was  at  his  disposal.  He  was  removed  by  the 
penetration  of  his  sagacity,  the  breadth  of  his  judgment,  his  knowledge  of 
human  nature,  and  his  divine  common  sense,  from  all  possibility  of  being 
duped  by  false  representations,  or  concealment  of  facts.  Unswerved  by  the 
favor  or  the  terror  of  the  king,  or  his  satellites,  from  the  bold  path  of  duty,  he 
went  forward,  demanding  from  Parliament  what  they  granted  without  hesi- 
tation j  for  England  well  knew  that  he  alone  had  rescued  her  name  from 
disgrace  on  the  continent  of  Europe.  The  hour,  too,  had  come  when  she  was  to 
place  herself  ahead  of  Russia,  then  rapidly  advancing  to  empire ;  of  Prussia, 
then,  under  the  great  Frederick,  beginning  a  career  of  steady  progress,  which 
was  ere  long  to  render  her  the  arbiter  of  all  Europe  ;  and  of  France,  which  had 
become  the  foremost  power  on  the  globe,  after  the  sceptre  of  Spain  had  begun 
to  relax  from  the  grasp  of  her  departing  statesmen.  Of  all  men  who,  during 
this  period,  controlled  the  British  empire,  Pitt  was  the  only  one  who  com- 
manded the  unlimited  confidence  of  Parliament,  of  England,  and  of  Amer- 
ica at  the  same  time.  He  had  pledged  himself  to  reimburse  to  the  colonists 
their  expenses  in  raising  troops,  and  now  he  promptly  redeemed  his  word. 
Nearly  a  million  dollars  was  devoted  to  that  purpose  for  the  last  campaign,  with 
which  Massachusetts,  with  her  share,  redeemed  what  would  otherwise  have  been 

been  seen  to  fall  together  ;  and   while  Benjamin   West  the  grief  of  the  son  fainting  at  the  fearful  recognition  of 

and    a   company   of  Pennsylvanians   formed    a   circle  his   father,  the  groups  of  soldiers  sorrowing   over  the 

around,   the    Indians   removed  the   thick  covering  of  ghastly  ruins  of  an  army,  formed  a  sombre  scene  of  des- 

leaves,  tin  they  bared  the  relics  of  the  youth  lying  across  olation.     How  is  all  changed  !     The  banks  of  the  broad 

those  of  the  older  officer.     The  frames  of  the  two  thus  and    placid    Monongahela  6mile    with   orchards   and 

united  in  death  were  wrapped  in  a  Highland  plaid,  and  teeming   harvests  and  gardens  ;  with  workshops  and 

consigned  to  one  separate  grave,  amidst  the  ceremonies  villas  ;  the  victories  of  peace  have  effaced  the  memorials 

hat  belong  to  the  burial  of  the  brave.      The  bones  of  of  war  ;  a  railroad  that  sends  its  cars  over  the  Allegha- 

•he  undistmguishable  multitude,  more  than  four  hun-  nies  in  fewer  hours  than  the  army  had  taken  weeks  fct 

dred  and  fifty  in  number,  were  indiscriminately  cast  its  unresisted  march,  passes  through    the  scene  where 

into  the  ground,  no  one  knowing  for  whom  specially  to  the  carnage  was  the  worst ;  and   in  all  that  -egion  no 

weep.     The  chilling  gloom  of  the  forest  at  the  coming  sounds  now  prevail  but  of  life  and  activity  and  joy. ' 
»f  winter,  the  religious  awe  that  mastered  the  savages, 


158         LOSS  OF  FORT  NIAGARA  FATAL  TO  THE  FRENCH. 

worthless  promises  to  pay.  This  pledge  had  been  made  by  Pitt  under  the 
seal  of  secrecy ;  the  secret  had  been  sacredly  kept ;  and  the  pledge  was  as 
sacredly  redeemed.  At  this  time  the  great  minister  could  do  anything  with  tht 
English  race  throughout  the  globe ;  as  far  as  the  epithet  can  ever  be  applied 
to  human  power,  he  was  omnipotent. 

In  connection  with  the  best  men  in  England  and  America,  officers  and 
civilians,  especially  with  Benjamin  Franklin,  he  clearly  saw  the  necessities 
of  the  case  ;  and  partly  by  his  own  monitions,  and  in  full  concurrence  with 
the  best  advice,  he  determined  to  send  a  strong  land  and  naval  force 
under  Gen.  Wolfe  up  the  St.  Lawrence  to  attack  Quebec.  Amherst,  who 
had  superseded  the  unsuccessful  Abercrombie,  was  to  expel  the  French  from 
the  region  of  Lake  George  and  Lake  Champlain,  seize  Montreal,  and  join 
the  command  at  Quebec.  Another  expedition  under  Gen.  Prideau  was  to 
seize  Fort  Niagara,  from  whence,  with  all  his  forces,  he  was  to  sail  down 
Lake  Ontario  to  Montreal.  It  was  a  well-planned  campaign,  and  could  hardly 
fail. 

Ticonderoga  Abandoned,  July  22,  1759. — A  more  formidable  army  of 
eleven  thousand  men  now  appeared  before  Ticonderoga,  under  Gen. 
Amherst.  Wolfe  had  already — June  27 — reached  Quebec,  and  the  French 
general  had  received  the  news.  Seeing  that  all  resistance  was  vain,  he  resolved 
on  the  demolition  of  the  fort,  which  he  partially  accomplished,  and  then 
escaped  with  his  army  to  Crown  Point.  But  thither  he  was  pursued  by 
Amherst,  and  on  the  first  of  August  he  escaped  down  the  lake  to  Isle 
Aux  Noix,  in  the  Sorelle  river,  where  he  was  still  followed.  But  the  season 
was  too  late  for  further  operations,  and  Amherst  returned  to  Crown  Point 
for  winter  quarters,  where  he  constructed  a  strong  fortress,  on  whose  pictu- 
resque ruins  the  traveler  still  looks  with  surprise  and  admiration. 

Joined  by  Sir  William  Johnson's  forces,  Gen.  Prideau  gathered  his  army 
at  Oswego,  and  sailed  up  the  lake  to  Niagara.  On  the  17th  of  July,  he 
commenced  a  siege  ;  but  by  the  bursting  of  a  cannon,  he  lost  his  life  the 
same  day.  Gen.  Johnson  pressed  the  siege,  and  when  the  fort  was  about  to 
surrender,  reinforcements  of  three  thousand  men, — about  equally  divided 
between  the  French  regulars  and  Indian  allies, — came  to  their  relief.  But  the 
following  day  a  fierce  battle  was  fought,  which  ended  in  the  surrender  of  Fort 
Niagara,  with  its  garrison  of  seven  hundred  men,  and  the  retreat  of  the  rest 
of  the  French  army.  The  loss  of  Niagara  was  fatal  to  the  French  power. 
Its  last  connecting  link  between  the  north  and  the  south  was  broken  forever. 

The  Expedition  to  Quebec. — Wolfe,  then  only  thirty-three  years  old,  but 
with  vast  experience,  left  Louisburg  with  his  splendid  expedition  of  eight 
thousand  troops,  under  the  convoy  of  twenty-two  line-of-battle  ships,  and  as 
many  frigates  and  smaller  vessels,  commanded  by  Admirals  Sanders  and 
Holmes,  and  on  the  27th  of  June  landed  at  Orleans  Island,  of  which  we 
spoke  in  our  earlier  piges  as  the  rendezvous  of  Jacques  Cartier  in  1534. 


DEATH  OF  WOLFE  AND  MONTCALM,  159 

I  have  already  described  the  position  of  Quebec ;  nor  can  I  spare  much 
space  for  the  military  scenes  now  to  be  witnessed  around  it.  On  a  level 
plateau,  three  hundred  feet  above  the  river,  called  the  Plains  of  Abraham,  a 
desperate  and  splendid  battle  was  to  be  fought.  The  lower  town  could  be 
gained  only  by  cannonading  from  Port  Levi,  directly  opposite  Quebec,  and 
this  was  done  only  by  throwing  in  hot  shot,  which  nearly  effected  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  lower  town.  On  the  3d  of  July,  Gen.  Monckton  with  his  grena- 
diers, landed  on  the  beach,  and  trusting  to  the  valor  of  his  men,  rushed  pre- 
cipitously upon  the  enemy's  works.  He  performed  prodigies  of  valor,  and  a 
fierce  struggle  was  carried  on  till  night  shut  down  on  them  prematurely  by  a 
terrific  thunder-storm,  which  had  been  gathering  for  hours,  and  now  closed  ovei 
the  whole  scene.  The  rising  tide  had  already  begun  to  rush  in,  and  Monck- 
ton was  compelled  to  retreat,  leaving  five  hundred  fallen  men  behind  him. 

Amherst,  who  was  to  have  joined  him  by  this  time,  had  not  been  heard 
from.  Two  months  had  gone  by,  and  Quebec  seemed  no  nearer  to  falling 
into  Wolfe's  hands.  At  last,  thrown  into  a  violent  fever  by  continued  exposure 
and  anxiety  for  two  months,  the  first  of  September  found  the  gallant  soldier 
prostrate  in  his  tent.  He  summoned  a  council  of  war.  It  was  proposed  to 
scale  the  heights  of  Abraham.  '  It  is  well  proposed,'  said  Wolfe,  '  and  I  will 
lead  the  assault  in  person : '  and  he  rose  from  his  bed  to  put  on  his  uniform. 
The  skilful  manoeuvres  of  the  fleet  completely  deceived  the  French 
commander :  so  silently  and  adroitly  was  it  managed  that  when  the  sun  rose 
on  the  morning  of  September  13th,  the  whole  .of  Wolfe's  army  stood  drawn 
up  in  line  of  battle  on  the  Plains  of  Abraham.  The  conflict  began.  Mont- 
calm did  his  best  to  atone  for  what  seemed  a  lack  of  vigilance,  and  he  cen- 
tred his  forces  with  incredible  celerity.  It  was  a  close,  hand  to  hand, 
desperate  struggle.  Every  implement  of  warfare  known,  was  brought  into 
action.  Twice  Wolfe  was  wounded,  but  he  still  kept  his  feet.  Seeing  at  last 
where  a  final  charge  could  be  made  that  would  win  the  day,  he  sprang  to  the 
head  of  his  Grenadiers,  and  led  them  to  the  charge.  But  a  bullet  pierced  his 
breast,  and  he  was  carried  to  the  rear.  Monckton  took  his  place,  only  to  fall 
wounded.  Townsend  then  directed  the  battle,  and  led  forward  the  British 
regulars  in  one  of  those  deadly  assaults  which  have  made  English  bayonets 
and  Highland  broadswords  immortal  in  the  history  of  chivalry.  Montcalm 
received  his  death  wound,  and  his  whole  army  broke  and  fled. 

Something  more  is  due  than  the  passing  tribute  we  can  give  to  such  sublime 
valor.  Montcalm  was  carried  into  the  city.  They  told  him  he  must  die. 
'  So  much  the  better,'  said  he,  '  I  shall  thus  be  spared  the  mortification  of 
witnessing  the  surrender  of  Quebec'  As  Wolfe  was  borne  off  dying, — '  They 
flee  !  They  flee  ! ' — smote  on  his  ears.  ■  Who  ?  '  '  The  French.' — And  with 
a  smile  of  triumph,  his  gallant  spirit  passed  away.1 

1  His  remains  are  yet  in  Quebec  ;  those  of  Wolfe  dedicated  to  the  linked  memory  of  Wolfe  and  Mont- 
were  conveyed  to  England.  People  of  the  two  nations  calm. — Lossing's  Hist,  of  the  U.  S.,  p.  202.  Note. 
have  long  dwelt  peaceably  together  in  that  ancient  city,  Montcalm's  ashes  rest  beneath  the  Ursuline  Convert 
and  they  have  united  in  erecting  a  tall  granite  obelisk,  at  Quebec. 


x6o  CLOSE  OF  THE  SEVEN  YEARS'   WAR. 

Five  days  later,  Gen.  Murray  marched  into  the  city  of  Quebec,  which 
had  surrendered,  and  the  Lilies  were  lowered,  as  the  British  standard  waved 
over  the  surrendered  capital  of  New  France. 

And  yet  the  French  empire  in  North  America  had  not  fallen.  Mont- 
real still  held  out,  and  it  was  being  strongly  fortified  against  another  cam- 
paign. 

Final  Campaign  of  1760 — Close  of  the  Seven  Year  5^  War. — The  last  hope 
of  the  French  dominion  in  America  now  hung  upon  the  conduct  of  Vau- 
dreuil,  the  Governor-general  of  Canada,  who  had  gathered  all  his  forces  at 
Montreal,  his  last  stronghold.  Resolute  to  recover  Quebec,  he  despatched 
De  Levi,  his  ablest  commander,  down  the  St.  Lawrence,  with  six  frigates  and  a 
land  force  of  10,000  men.  With  a  folly  little  short  of  madness  Murray 
marched  out  from  his  impregnable  city — April  28 — and  hazarded  an  attack 
on  the  enemy  in  Sillery  Wood,  where  he  met  with  an  ignominious  defeat, 
leaving  his  whole  train  of  fine  artillery,  and  a  thousand  men  on  the  field. 
The  French  siege  began,  and  the  English  garrison,  which  had  been  so  reduced 
by  sickness  and  death  during  the  previous  winter,  could  after  the  late  battle 
have  numbered  little  more  than  two  thousand  effective  men j  and  had 
not  a  fleet  arrived,  which  Pitt  had  despatched  to  join  Amherst  in  his  attempt 
on  Montreal,  Murray  would  have  been  obliged  to  surrender.  The  news  is  best 
given  by  the  minister  himself  in  a  letter  to  his  wife.  '  Join,  my  love,  with  me  in 
most  humble  and  grateful  thanks  to  the  Almighty.  The  siege  of  Quebec  was 
raised  on  the  17th  of  May,  with  every  happy  circumstance.  The  enemy 
left  their  camp  standing,  abandoning  forty  pieces  of  cannon.  Swanton 
arrived  there  in  the  Vanguard  on  the  fifteenth,  and  destroyed  all  the  French 
shipping,  six  or  seven  in  number.  Happy,  happy  day!  My  joy  and  hurry 
are  inexpressible.' 

On  the  6th  of  September  Amherst  reached  Montreal  with  ten  thousand 
troops,  and  Gen.  Johnson  with  a  thousand  warriors  of  the  Six  Nations.  The 
same  day,  Gen.  Murray  appeared  with  four  thousand  troops  from  Quebec ;  and 
the  day  after,  Col.  Haviland,  with  three  thousand,  came  in  from  Crown  Point. 
1  Thus  the  three  armies  came  together  in  overwhelming  strength  to  take  an 
open  town  of  a  few  hundred  inhabitants,  which  Vaudreuil  had  resolved  to  give 
up  on  the  first  appearance  of  the  English  ;  and  on  the  eighth  of  September,  the 
flag  of  St.  George  floated  in  triumph  on  the  gate  of  Montreal,  the  admired 
island  of  Jacques  Cartier,  the  ancient  hearth  of  the  council-fires  of  the  Wyan- 
dots,  the  village  consecrated  by  the  Roman  church  to  the  Virgin  Mary,  a  site 
connected  by  rivers  and  lakes  with  an  inland  world,  and  needing  only  a  some- 
what milder  climate  to  be  one  of  the  most  attractive  spots  on  the  continent. 
The  capitulation  included  all  Canada,  which  was  said  to  extend  to  the  crest  of 
land  dividing  branches  of  Erie  and  Michigan  from  those  of  the  Miami,  the 
Wabash,  and  the  Illinois  rivers.  Property  and  religion  were  cared  for  in  the 
terms ;  but  for  civil  liberty  no  stipulation  was  even  thought  of.     Thus  Canada, 


CONSPIRACY  AND  DEATH  OF  PONT/AC  161 

under  the  forms  of  a  despotic  administration,  came  into  the  possession  of 
England  by  conquest ;  and  in  a  conquered  country  the  law  was  held  to  be  the 
pleasure  of  the  king.'  ' 

The  fall  of  the  last  French  fortress  in  North  America  brought  this  long 
and  sanguinary  war  to  a  close.  But  its  fires  were  still  burning  along  the 
shores  of  the  Great  Lakes,  and  eastward  from  the  Mississippi  valley  to  the 
settlements  of  the  southern  colonies.  The  Cherokees  had  hitherto  been 
friendly  to  the  Americans.  But  they  had  many  old  revenges  yet  to  pay  for 
outrages  on  their  southwestern  frontiers.  The  emissaries  of  France  had  so 
thoroughly  stirred  up  their  hostility,  that  it  was  no  longer  possible  to 
restrain  them,  and  the  borders  of  the  Carolinas  were  made  desolate.  Am- 
herst had  already  sent  Col.  Montgomery  with  an  effective  body  of  troops, 
who  had  advanced  from  Charleston  and  laid  waste  a  portion  of  the  Cherokee 
territory ;  but  it  became  necessary  the  following  year  for  Col.  Grant  to 
finish  the  work  ;  and  so  completely  were  their  villages  destroyed,  and  their 
fields  laid  waste,  and  so  many  of  their  warriors  had  fallen  in  battle,  that  they 
begged  for  peace.     Tranquillity  at  last  came  to  those  suffering  settlers. 

Pontiac  and  his  Conspiracy. — Another  foe,  still  more  formidable,  was  to 
be  encountered  in  the  northwest.  Pontiac,  the  brave  and  diplomatic  chief 
of  the  Ottawas,  who  had  been  a  bitter  foe  of  the  English,  and  long  an  ally 
of  the  French,  had  secretly  confederated  a  large  number  of  the  Algonquin 
tribes,  organizing  the  Chippewas,  Wyandots,  Miamis,  Potawotamies,  Shaw- 
noese,  Foxes,  Winnebagos,  and  the  Senecas — the  most  westerly  clan  of  the 
Six  Nations — for  the  general  massacre  of  the  English  scattered  through  the 
whole  of  the  northwest.  With  the  exception  of  Niagara,  Fort  Pitt,  and 
Detroit,  all  the  English  posts  had  fallen  into  their  hands.  Even  Detroit, 
after  a  siege  of  twelve  months,  was  relieved  only  by  the  arrival  of  Col. 
Bradstreet,  in  May,  1764.  But  under  that  gallant  and  efficient  officer,  the 
power  of  Pontiac  was  broken,  and  the  conspiracy  dissolved.  The  tribes  ali 
yielded  to  the  irresistible  power  of  the  Pale-faces ;  but  Pontiac,  like  Philip, 
whose  history  he  knew,  and  whom  he  closely  resembled  in  character  as  in 
fate,  was  too  proud  to  yield.  He  would  not  join  the  chiefs  of  other  tribes 
who  went  to  sue  for  pardon  ;  and  being  obliged  to  flee,  he  took  refuge  in  the 
country  of  the  Illinois,  where  after  a  sad  and  disturbed  life  for  four  years,  he 
fell  a  victim,  like  Philip,  to  those  in  whom  he  had  confided. 

This  great  chief  was  endowed  with  qualities  so  lofty  and  heroic  that  they 
commanded  the  admiration  of  Montcalm,  whose  personal  friendship  and  con- 
fidence he  long  enjoyed  ;  and  so  thoroughly  had  he  mastered  the  elements  of 
civilization  that  he  issued  bills  of  credit,  which  were  freely  accepted  by  the. 
Canadian  French.  He  found  in  one  of  the  most  elegant  scholars  of  New 
England  a  brilliant  biographer,  and  a  grave  on  the  banks  of  the  Missouri,  where 
the  vast  city  of  St.  Louis  has  displaced  the  forest  that  waved  over  his  tomb  \ 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  iv.  pp.  360-361. 


1 62  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  SEVEN  YEARS  WAR. 

and  as  Lossing  appropriately  says,  constitutes,  if  not  his  memorial,  at  least 
his  monument. 

Significance  of  the  French  War. — This  Seven  Years'  Struggle,  which  vir 
tually  ended  the  history  of  the  French  Empire  in  North  America,  derives  foi 
us  its  chief  significance,  as  the  prelude  to  the  Revolution  so  soon  to  follow. 
In  its  scenes  of  struggle  and  blood,  it  was  but  a  prologue  to  the  impending 
tragedy.  It  was  a  school  of  training  for  the  Generals  of  the  Revolution.  It 
taught  the  colonists  the  art  of  war,  as  conducted  by  the  captains  of  Europe. 
It  was  a  school  for  instruction  in  military  engineering ;  in  evolutions  of  con- 
siderable bodies  of  men  ;  in  the  planning  and  consummation  of  campaigns  ; 
in  the  construction,  as  well  as  the  use  of  fire-arms,  and  munitions  of  war. 
The  knowledge  which  our  military  men  then  possessed  of  the  mode  of  carry- 
ing on  war  with  hostile  savages,  was  supplemented  by  the  knowledge  of 
prosecuting  regular  military  campaigns.  As  a  civil  lesson,  too,  its  impor- 
tance can  hardly  be  exaggerated.  The  colonists  became  familiar  with  the  idea 
of  consolidation  ;  of  blending  their  united  civil  sovereignties  in  a  federal 
whole.  They  learned  practically  that  union  is  strength,  and  were  prepared 
to  act  together.  They  found  out  who  were  their  strong  men.  They  learned 
the  duties,  and  felt  the  dignity  of  responsible  citizenship.  It  was  a  constant 
discipline  in  acquiring  self-control ;  devising  means  for  sudden  extrication 
from  difficulties  ;  of  gathering  up  and  husbanding  resources  of  all  kinds  ;  of 
making  the  most  out  of  the  least.  The  French  War  was  an  open  school  to 
which  everybody  went ;  many  to  teach,  but  all  to  learn.  This  sifting  sepa- 
rated the  grain  from  the  chaff ;  it  reduced  lymph,  and  hardened  muscle.  It 
burnished  character.  In  after  years,  when  nobly  defending  the  American 
colonies  in  the  British  Parliament,  Burke  strikingly  illustrated  the  process  of 
the  growth  of  American  character  :  ■  These  colonies  are  yet  in  the  gristie  ; 
they  have  not  hardened  into  bone.' 


SECTION    FOURTH. 

THE  INTERVAL  FROM    THE    CLOSE  OF  THE    CONFLICT  WITH  FRANCE,  TO  THE  BE- 
GINNING   OF   THE    STRUGGLE    WITH    ENGLAND. 

Some  of  the  most  important  processes  in  nature  often  go  on  so  silently 
that  they  escape  observation.  It  is  during  the  most  tranquil  hours  of  the 
night  that  we  are  least  frequently  roused  by  the  voice  of  the  watchman. 
Hence  we  are  apt  to  glance  somewhat  hurriedly  over  those  periods  in  the 
fives  of  men  and  nations  which  were  attended  by  the  least  tumult.  And  yet 
these  are  generally  the  very  periods  which  are  most  pregnant  with  the  embry- 
onic forms  of  future  life.  The  smoothness  of  the  surface,  and  the  repose  of 
the  heavens,  give  no  tokens  of  the  approaching  storm. 

The  surrender  of  Montreal  brought  security  to  the  worn  and  weary  colo- 


A  NATIONAL  EPIC  ON  THE  INTERVAL.  163 

nies,  and  for  the  first  time  in  their  history  they  could  dedicate  themselves 
without  disturbance  to  the  arts  of  peace.  This  Interval,  brief  as  it  was, 
between  the  close  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  and  the  petty  skirmish  of  Lexing- 
ton, which  opened  the  Iliad  of  the  Revolution,  was  of  the  deepest  moment  to 
our  ancestors.  When  the  eye  of  some  patient  historian  shall  look  long  and  care- 
fully enough  beneath  the  illusive  calm  which  now  hides  the  energies  of  these 
fifteen  years,  he  will  unveil  the  secret  operation  of  forces  which  were  ere  long 
to  break  forth  with  irresistible  power.  He  will  there  also  trace  the  germs  of 
our  future  national  life  in  the  workings  of  the  social  elements  of  those  primi- 
tive days.  The  time  for  that  great  work  may  not  yet  have  come  :  and  without 
a  paradox,  it  may  be  safe  to  say,  that,  obscure  as  the  period  of  which  I  am 
speaking  may  be,  we  are  not  yet  far  enough  removed  from  it  to  discern  it 
clearly.  The  truth  of  this  statement  has  been  often  and  strikingly  illustrated 
in  our  own  age,  which  has  thrown  new  light  over  so  many  dim  passages  in  the 
history  of  individuals  and  peoples  that  had  long  ago  passed  away.  Here- 
after, the  grave  must  give  up  its  dead — the  past  can  no  longer  hide  its  hoarded 
secrets  from  the  scrutiny  of  the  pen  or  the  pencil. 

In  such  investigations  science  is  the  torchbearer — learning  the  interpreter. 
We  turn  wearied  from  the  oppressive  tomes  of  Gibbon,  to  the  charming  paint- 
ings of  the  '  Last  Days  of  Pompeii,'  to  see-what  kind  of  a  life  Roman  men  and 
women  lived.  In  the  entrancing  sketches  of  Ware's  'Zenobia'  we  walk  the 
streets  of  Palmyra,  and  breathe  the  intoxicating  air  of  the  gardens  of  the  ori- 
ental Queen ;  while  we  look  into  the  illuminated  cell  of  Longinus  to  find  the 
Greek  Philosophy  expiring  before  the  rising  sun  of  Christianity.  We  find  the 
best  history  of  the  descendants  of  Hagar,  in  the  '  Arabian  Nights.'  In  '  The 
Scarlet  Letter,'  and  '  The  House  of  the  Seven  Gables,'  the  genial  Hawthorne 
has  told  us  more  of  the  real  life  of  the  Puritans,  than  Neal  in  his  extended  '  His- 
tory' ;  while  Mrs.  Stowe's  Novels  give  us  more  vivid  conceptions  of  society  in 
the  New  England  of  a  hundred  years  ago,  than  all  the  Massachusetts  Historical 
Collections.  The  life  of  the  frontier  and  the  forest  was  finished  when  the  last 
of  the  *  Leatherstocking  Tales '  was  completed ;  and  the  only  delineation  of  life 
on  the  ocean  that  will  ever  be  needed  for  calm,  or  storm,  or  seamanship  or 
battle,  is  found  in  the  '  Sea  Stories '  of  the  same  author.  So  too  shall  we  yet 
have  a  great  Historical  painting  of  the  Interval,  and  it  will  be  our  first  Na- 
tional Epic — a  romance — a  poem,  in  prose  or  verse — no  matter  which.  The 
materials  all  lie  there  in  their  long-neglected  sepulchre.  Breathing  images 
of  life  will  spring  forth  at  the  waving  of  the  magic  wand  of  genius. 

The  stern  discipline  of  patient  industry  and  self-denial  had  inculcated  the 
best  lessons  of  frugality  and  independence  among  all  classes,  especially  by 
ennobling  the  character  of  the  women  of  America.1    Seven  campaigns  with  the 

>   Bancroft  abounds  in  striking  sketches  of  the  pur-  a  territorial  parish.     The  town  was  the  religious  congre- 

suits  and  characteristics  of  the  New  England  people  at  gation  ;  the  independent  church  was  established  by  law, 

this  period— as  witness  the  following  :  the  minister  was  elected  by  the  people,  who  annually 

All  New  England  was  an  aggregate  of  organized  de-  made  grants  for  his  support.      There,  too,  the  system 

mocracies.    But  the  complete  development  of  the  institu-  of  free-schools  was  carried  to  great  peifection,  so  that 

ion  was  to  be  found  in  Connecticut  and  The  Massachu-  there  could  not  be  found  an  adult  born  in  New  England 

«etts  Bay.     There  each  township  was  also  substantially  unable  to  write  and  read.     .      .      .     They  \»  ire  of  ho» 


164  MOULDING  OF  OUR  NATIONAL  CHARACTER, 

best  soldiers  of  Europe  had  thoroughly  taught  young  men  the  art  of  war,  x  ml 
provided  generals  for  the  impending  Revolution.  The  exigencies  of  s.ich  a  life 
gave  birth  to  every  virtue  which  exalts  or  adorns  human  nature  in  its  best 
estate. 

The  laws  of  growth  and  development  in  individuals  and  in  communities,  veem 
to  bear  a  very  close  resemblance.  The  character  of  a  people  as  an  aggregate,  is 
determined  by  the  very  same  influences  which  decide  the  units  that  make  up 
the  whole.  Original  tendencies  always  work  themselves  out.  We  trace  about 
the  same  stages  of  growth — we  mark  the  same  transitions  in  men  and  nations 
from  periods  of  repose  to  activity,  that  we  observe  in  the  rounds  of  the  seasons 

This  was  a  period  of  broad  and  intense  political  study.  Not  a  young  law- 
yer but  became  familiar  with  the  Judicial  Literature  of  England.  The  Common 
Law  was  the  theme  of  general  interest  for  the  first  time  in  any  community. 
Political  meetings  for  earnest  and  profound  debate  were  held  in  every  city  and 
hamlet.  Natural  human  rights  was  the  all-absorbing  subject  of  discussion. 
Thoroughness  of  investigation  was  the  rule.  Nearly  all  the  leading  men  in 
the  colonies  had  been  hard  students  in  our  nine  colleges,  and  many  of  them 
had  passed  through  the  universities  of  England  or  the  continent.  Others, 
like  Patrick  Henry,  who  had  been  suddenly  drawn  into  public  life  with  little 
or  no  knowledge  of  books,  had  been  close  observers  of  men  and  nature,  and 
their  large  native  endowments  more  than  atoned  for  the  lack  of  scholastic 
training.  Others  still  of  less  stormy  temperaments — but  of  sterling  qualities-  • 
had,  like  Roger  Sherman,  elaborated  a  system  of  political  economy  over  th** 
work-bench,  or  the  lap-stone.  But  one  and  all  had  done  their  work  so  well, 
that  the  result  amazed  the  ripest  scholars,  and  the  most  accomplished  states- 
men of  Europe. 

The  American  Press  was  an  efficient  schoolmaster.     Newspapers,  and  espe- 
cially pamphlets,  were  universally  read,  and  they  teemed  with  the  profoundest 
thought.     In  sound  political  philosophy  and  clear  thinking  in  the  right  diret 
tion,  they  far  surpassed  the  journalism  and  political  essays  of  England.1 

The  Pulpit  too  was  another,  and  still  greater  educator ;  for  it  was  charac 
terized  by  the  ripest  learning,  and  it  flamed  with  the  eloquence  of  patriotic 
fire.     It  led  and  inspired  the  people.     Even  the  period  of  the  Protestant  Re- 

mogeneous  origin,  nearly  all  tracing  their  descent  to  having  frowned  on  the  business !  How  committees  of 
English  emigrants  of  the  reigns  of  Charles  I.  and  the  House  of  Commons  examined  witnesses  and  made 
Charles  II.  They  were  a  frugal  and  industrious  race,  proposals  for  prohibitory  laws,  till  at  last  the  Manufac- 
Along  the  seaside,  wherever  there  was  a  good  harbor,  turing  House,  designed  to  foster  home  industry,  fell 
•Sshermen,  familiar  with  the  ocean,  gathered  in  hamlets  ;  into  decay, — a  commentary  on  the  provident  care  of 
and  each  returning  season  saw  them  with  an  ever-in-  England  for  her  colonies  !  Of  slavery,  there  was  not 
creasing  number  of  mariners  and  vessels,  taking  the  enough  to  affect  the  character  of  the  people,  except  in 
cod  and  mackerel,  and  sometimes  pursuing  the  whale  the  southeast  of  Rhode  Island,  where  Newport  was 
into  the  icy  labyrinths  of  the  northern  sea  ;  yet  loving  conspicuous  for  engaging  in  the  slave  trade,  and  where 
home,  and  dearly  attached  to  their  modest  freeholds,  in  two  or  three  towns  negroes  composed  even  a  third  o: 
At  Boston  a  society  was  formed  for  promoting  domestic  the  inhabitants. — Bancroft,  iv.,  149,  150. 
manufactures  ;  on  one  of  its  anniversaries,  three  hun-  1  The  newspapers  of  the  American  Colonies  were 
dred  women  appeared  on  the  Common,  clad  in  home-  established  in  the  following  order  : — The  first  in  Bos- 
spun,  seated  in  a  triple  row,  each  with  a  spinning-  ton.  the  JVctos  Letter,  1704.  In  Philadelphia,  1719. 
wheel,  and  each  busily  transferring  the  flax  from  the  In  New  York,  1725.  In  Maryland,  1728.  In  South 
distaff  to  the  spool.  The  town  built  a  Manufacturing  Carolina,  173 1.  In  Rhode  Island,  1732.  In  Virginia, 
House,  and  there  were  bounties  to  encourage  the  work-  1736.  In  New  Hampshire,  1753.  In  Connecticut, 
ers in  linen.  How  the  Board  of  Trade  were  alarmed  1755.  In  Delaware,  176 1.  In  North  Carolina,  1763, 
at   the   news  ■     How   they  censured  Shirley    for  not  In  Georgia,  1763.     In  New  Jersey,  177". 


THE  LEADERS  OF   THE  HUMAN  RACE.  *65 

formation  in  Europe  had  scarcely  been  distinguished  by  a  more  learned,  power- 
ful, or  spotless  clergy  than  adorned  and  blessed  the  American  Colonies.1 

The  work  of  those  nine  colonial  colleges,2  so  feebly  endowed  with  money 
or  apparatus,  was  truly  wonderful.  But  their  resources  in  talent,  learning 
and  character  were  affluent  beyond  estimate.  So  true  is  it  that  men,  not 
books,  nor  gold,  noi  stately  edifices  make  scholars.  Where  Aristotle  went 
was  the  Lyceum,  whether  in  Athens,  or  on  the  classic  banks  of  the  Ilissus. 
When  the  British  monk  Alcuin  left  the  library  of  York  Cathedral  at  the 
summons  of  Charlemagne,  he  carried  a  university  with  him  to  Aix-la-Cha- 
pelle.  When  the  prophets  of  Judah  left  the  ashes  of  the  Temple,  they  bore 
with  them  in  their  captivity  the  worship  of  the  true  God.  Where  Hannibal 
marched,  went  Carthage — no  matter  on  which  side  of  the  Mediterranean. 
Rome  was  where  Caesar  stood, — no  matter  on  which  side  of  the  Rubicon. 
Where  Justinian  was,  there  were  the  Pandects.  Where  Hildebrand  sat,  there 
was  the  Church.  When  Galileo  slept,  Astronomy  waited  for  his  waking. 
With  Loyola  travelled  the  Company  of  Jesus.  Poetry  itself  was  the  hand- 
maid of  Dante  throughout  his  weary  exile.  Painting  dwelt  where  Raphael 
lived.  Sculpture  made  her  home  with  Michael  Angelo.  Leonardo  meant 
all  art.  Zoology  followed  Agassiz  to  the  rocky  Penakese.  Where  the 
Highland  chieftain  sat  was  the  head  of  the  table.  When  the  Son  of  Mary 
glided  noiselessly  into  that  bolted  chamber  in  Galilee,  where  the  fugitive  dis- 
ciples had  gathered  in  obedience  to  the  command  of  their  risen  Master, 
conveyed  through  the  redeemed  Mary,  all  Christianity  was  within  the  four 
walls  of  that  narrow  room.  The  Hall  where  the  Signers  of  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence  assembled,  held  the  Republicanism  of  the  world. 
Where  Washington  marched,  there  went  the  Revolution. 

Never  was  it  truer  of  any  nation  than  our  own,  that  its  resources  could  be 
measured  by  no  material  standard.  It  is  mind,  not  gold,  nor  rifled  cannon 
that  moves  the  world.  America  meant  only  a  handful  of  men  and  women, — 
but  such  men  and  women  as  had  not  lived  before.  Pitt  and  Burke  under- 
stood this  j  but  poor  George  the  Third  and  his  favorites  comprehended  it  no 
better  than  the  Red  men  did  why  their  bullets  could  not  hit  the  American 
leader. 

1  In  Rev.  Dr.  William  Adams'  learned  and  eloquent  wards,  Hopkins,    Bellamy,    and   Emmons.      But    the 

Discourse  on  the  Life  and  Services  of  Prof .  Moses  fact  to  be  observed  is,  that  for  two-thirds  of  a  century 

Stuart,  January  25,  1852,  he  pays  a  worthy  and  en-  metaphysical  theology  had  gained  the  entire    ascen- 

lightened  tribute  to  the  learning  of  the  New  England  dency.' 
ministers: —  a  Order    in    which    the     Colonial    Colleges    were 

'Many  of  the  earliest  ministers  of  the  New  Eng-  founded: — 
land  colonies  were  men  of  extraordinary  scholarship.  1.  Harvard,  at  Cambridge,  Mass.,  in  1637. 

They  had   been   trained   at  the  English   universities,  2.  William  and   Mary,  at  Williamsburg,    Va.,    in 

and  that  at  the  golden  age  of  Biblical  learning.      .      .  1692. 

The  clergy  were  accustomed    to   read   Hebrew   and  3.  Vale,  at  Saybrook,  Conn.,   in  1701 — removed  to 

Greek   Scriptures   to    their  families  at  morning  and  New  Haven  in  1717. 

evening  worship.  .  .  Never  was  there  a  body  of  4.  The  College  of  New  Jersey — called  Nassau  Hall- 
men  who,  by  nature,  constitution,  and  external  circum-  at  Princeton,  New  Jersey,  1738. 

stances  were  more  disposed   to  follow  the  lead  of  their  5.  King's  College— now  Columbia — New  York  City, 

distinguished    countrymen    than    the    clergy  of    New  in  1750. 

England.     Their  habits  inclined  them  to  great  indepen-  6.  The  College  of  Philadelphia,  in  1760. 

dence  of  thought.     They  had  little  reverence  for  anti-  7.  The  College  of  Rhode  Island— now  Brown  Uni* 

quated  authority.     They  would  have  reasons  for  their  versity — at  Warren,  now  at  Providence,  1764. 
faith.     .     .      It  would  be  difficult  to  find  men  superior  8.  Queen's  (now  Rutgers)  College,  in  New  Jersey 

to  many  of  the  rural  ministers  of  those  days  in  meta-  in  1770. 

physical  acumen.     Whatever  maybe  :>  ought  of  their  9.  Dartmouth  College,  at   Hanover,  Nev  Hamp- 

[jarticilar   dogmas,  no  American  can  fail  to  honor  Ed-  shire,  in  1771. 
II 


io6  SECOND  RACE   OF  NATIONAL  MOULDERS. 

The  peril  is  that  in  books,  endowments,  buildings,  the  accessories  and  tht 
machinery  of  schools  for  Art  and  Learning,  we  accept  substitutes  for  men. 
Colleges  can  be  moved  without  taking  away  the  books  and  laboratories :  it 
has  been  often  done.  When  the  men  went  out,  it  mattered  very  little  how 
few  or  many  tomes  were  left  on  the  shelves.  All  this  may  illustrate  in  part 
the  truth  of  the  famous  declaration  of  the  great  British  statesmen  : — ■  America 
can  never  be  conquered.' 

SECTION    FIFTH. 

THE  SECOND  RACE  OF  MOULDERS  OF  AMERICAN  CHARACTER  AND  INSTITUTIONS. 

Benjamin  Franklin.  Born  in  Boston,  Jan.  17,  1706.  Died  in  Philadel- 
phia, April  17,  1790. — No  man  has  lived  in  America  who  has  stamped  his 
image  so  deep,  or  so  clear,  on  the  institutions  and  character  of  its  people  as 
Benjamin  Franklin  :  few  men  have  put  forth  a  broader  or  more  beneficent 
influence  upon  mankind ;  and  few  men  are  more  sure  of  lasting  fame.  So 
great  is  my  veneration  for  him,  I  cannot  mention  his  name  without  invoking 
such  words  as  would  seem  to  me  unsuited  to  any  other  American.  On  the 
occasion  of  one  of  the  meetings  of  the  Scientific  Congress  of  Italy,  when  cer- 
tain honors  were  to  be  paid  to  Franklin,  I  contributed  the  following  Mono- 
graph, which  seemed  none  too  elogistic  for  the  enthusiasm  of  the  countrymen 
of  Galvani,  Volta,  Vico,  and  Rienzi. 

FRANKLIN'S   VOICE   TO   AMERICA, 
i.  "I  was  born  poor,  but  I  lived  in  comfort,  and  died  rich. 

2.  "With  few  to  help  me,  I  found  in  hard  work  a  friend  in  need. 

3.  "  When  I  was  poor,  I  lived  poor,  and  saved  what  pennies  I  could. 

4.  "When  I  got  to  be  fore-handed,  I  could  help  others  less  fortunate. 

5.  "  I  managed  to  stand  up  straight  when  I  had  to  stand  alone. 

6.  "  With  nobody  to  teach  me,  I  became  my  own  schoolmasetr. 

7.  "I  had  suffered,  and  I  did  not  like  to  see  any  friend  suffer. 

8.  "  I  loved  virtue  and  thrift,  and  hated  vice,  laziness,  and  waste. 

9.  "  I  gained  many  friends,  but  only  by  trying  to  do  right. 

10.  "  So  many  did  me  good  that  I  tried  to  do  good  to  all. 

11.  "I  early  learned  how  to  work,  and  endeavored  to  teach  others. 

12.  "I  had  very  many  faults,  and  I  tried  hard  to  correct  them. 

13.  "I  served  my  country  through  life  with  what  little  ability  I  could. 

11. 
AMERICA'S   RESPONSE   TO   FRANKLIN. 

1.  "  We  are  born  rich,  enjoy  little,  and  too  often  die  poor. 

2.  "  With  too  much  help,  we  work  only  when  we  are  obliged  to. 

3    "  When  we  are  poor  we  live  rich ;  when  rich,  we  lay  up  nothing. 
4.   "  When  wealth  comes  to  us,  we  let  others  take  care  of  themselves. 


CHARACTER  ,0F  BENJAMIN  FRANKLIN.  167 

5.  "We  are  more  fond  of  leaning  on  others  than  of  standing  alone. 

6.  "  Brought  up  among  teachers,  how  much  true  wisdom  do  we  gain  ? 

7.  "We  suffer  too  little  to  know  how  to  feel  sympathy  for  our  fellows. 

8.  "We  are  almost  strangers  to  the  stern  virtues  of  our  fathers. 

9.  "  Self-interest  and  not  integrity  determines  our  friendships. 

10.  "  Sublime  lesson  !  its  practice  won  you  the  heart  of  the  world, 

xi.  "  We  venerate  you  as  the  great  Worker  of  your  age. 

12.  "Your  faults  are  forgotten  ;  your  virtues  will  live  forever. 

13.  "We  will  show  our  gratitude  to  you  by  fidelity  to  our  country. 

in. 
THE   WORLD'S   CHORUS   TO   FRANKLIN. 

"We  come  from  all  Lands,  but  you  are  our  Father.  You  were  the  First  Teach- 
er of  America,  and  we  are  going  to  School  to  you  to-day.  You  have  taught  the 
Nations  how  to  plant  the  Tree  of  Liberty  in  the  Soil  of  Despotism  ;  how  Chil- 
dren may  become  Men  j  how  Men  may  be  Free,  and  work  and  love  and  help 
one  another,  and  grow  into  rich  and  powerful  communities  ;  and  how,  at  last, 
the  whole  Earth  may  come  together  in  a  Universal  Republic,  and  sit  at  peace 
under  God's  broad  Tree  of  Freedom,  with  none  to  molest  or  make  them  afraid. 

"  You  are  the  Presiding  Genius  of  every  Printing-Office,  of  every  Savings 
Bank,  and  every  Workshop.  You  are  invoked  in  every  Academy  of  Science, 
and  in  every  Hall  of  Legislation.  Your  Spirit  breathes  through  every  story- 
book and  hovers  along  every  Telegraph  Wire.  You  were  the  Prophet  of  Free- 
dom and  the  Instructor  of  Mankind.    All  Nations  rise  up  and  call  you  blessed." 

The  most  captivating  writer  of  American  biography  is  Mr.  James  Parton. 
In  his  'Life  and  Times  of  Benjamin  Franklin/  after  beguiling  the  readef 
through  two  massive  volumes  of  brilliant  narration,  which  seem  more  like  a 
charming  pilgrimage  through  a  broad  landscape  garden,  than  an  authentic 
biography,  he  thus  records  the  Catalogue  of  the  good  deeds  of  Frank- 
lin, with  the  monumental  brevity  and  precision  of  a  sculptor  : 

He  founded  the  Philadelphia  Library,  parent  of  a  thousand  libraries,  an 
immense  and  endless  good  to  the  whole  United  States. 

He  edited  the  best  newspaper  in  the  Colonies ;  one  which  published  no 
libels,  and  fomented  no  quarrels ;  which  quickened  the  intelligence  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  gave  the  onward  impulse  to  the  press  of  America. 

He  was  the  first  who  turned  to  great  account  the  engine  of  advertising,  an 
indispensable  element  in  modern  business. 

He  published  Poor  Richard,  by  means  of  which  so  much  of  the  wit  and 
wisdom  of  all  ages  as  its  readers  could  appropriate  and  enjoy,  was  brought 
home  to  their  minds,  in  words  they  could  understand  and  remember  forever. 

He  created  the  post-office  system  of  America,  and  forbore  to  avail  hin»> 
self,  as  postmaster,  of  privileges  for  lack  of  which  he  had  formerly  suffered. 

It  was  he  who  caused  Philadelphia  to  be  paved,  lighted,  and  cleaned. 


i68  CATALOGUE   OF  FRANKLIN'S  DEEDS. 

As  fuel  became  scarce  in  the  vicinity  of  the  colonial  towns,  he  invented 
the  Franklin  Stove,  which  economized  it,  and  suggested  the  subsequent 
warming  inventions,  in  which  America  beats  the  world.  Besides  making  a 
free  gift  of  this  invention  to  the  public,  he  generously  wrote  an  extensive 
uamphlet  explaining  its  construction  and  utility. 

He  delivered  civilized  mankind  from  the  nuisance,  once  universal,  of 
smoky  chimneys. 

He  was  the  first  effective  preacher  of  the  blessed  gospel  of  ventilation. 
He  spoke,  and  the  windows  of  hospitals  were  lowered ;  consumption  ceased 
to  gasp,  and  fever  to  inhale  poison. 

He  devoted  the  leisure  of  seven  years,  and  all  the  energy  of  his  genius,  to 
the  science  of  electricity,  which  gave  a  stronger  impulse  to  scientific  inquiry 
than  any  other  event  of  that  century.  He  taught  Goethe  to  experiment  in 
electricity,  and  set  all  students  to  making  electrical  machines.  He  robbed 
thunder  of  its  terrors,  and  lightning  of  its  power  to  destroy. 

He  was  chiefly  instrumental  in  founding  the  first  high  school  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  died  protesting  against  the  abuse  of  the  funds  of  that  institution 
in  teaching  American  youth  the  languages  of  Greece  and  Rome,  while 
French,  Spanish,  and  German  were  spoken  in  the  streets,  and  were  required 
in  the  commerce  of  the  wharves. 

He  founded  the  American  Philosophical  Society,  the  first  organization  in 
America  of  the  friends  of  science. 

He  suggested  the  use  of  mineral  manures,  introduced  the  basket  willow, 
and  promoted  the  early  culture  of  silk. 

He  lent  the  indispensable  assistance  of  his  name  and  tact  to  the  found- 
ing of  the  Philadelphia  Hospital. 

Entering  into  politics,  he  broke  the  spell  of  Quakerism,  and  woke  Penn- 
sylvania from  the  dream  of  unarmed  safety. 

He  led  Pennsylvania  in  its  thirty  years'  struggle  with  the  mean  tyranny  of 
the  Penns,  a  rehearsal  of  the  subsequent  contest  with  the  King  of  Great 
Britain. 

When  the  Indians  were  ravaging  and  scalping  within  eighty  miles  of 
Philadelphia,  General  Benjamin  Franklin  led  the  troops  of  the  city  against 
them. 

He  was  the  author  of  the  first  scheme  of  uniting  the  Colonies,  a  scheme  so 
suitable  that  it  was  adopted,  in  its  essential  features,  in  the  Union  of  the 
States,  and  binds  us  together  to  this  day. 

He  assisted  England  to  keep  Canada,  when  there  was  danger  of  its  falling 
back  into  the  hands  of  a  reactionary  race. 

More  than  any  other  man,  he  was  instrumental  in  causing  the  repeal  of 
the  Stamp  Act,  which  deferred  the  inevitable  struggle  until  the  Colonies  were 
strong  enough  to  triumph. 

More  than  any  other  man,  he  educated  the  Colonies  up  to  independence, 
and  secured  for  them  in  England  the  sympathy  and  support  of  the  Brights, 
tfie  Cobdens,  the  Spencers,  and  Mills  of  that  day.     His  examination  before 


FRANKLIN'S   SERVICES   TO  MANKIND.  169 

the  House  of  Commons  struck  both  countries  as  the  speeches  of  Henry  Ward 
Beecher — a  genuine  brother  of  Franklin — did  in  the  autumn  of  1863.  As  the 
eloquent  preacher  set  England  right  upon  the  questions  of  to-day,  so  did 
Franklin  upon  those  of  1765.  And  Franklin  would  have  kept  her  right,  but 
for  the  impenetrable  stupidity  of  George  III. 

He  discovered  the  temperature  of  the  Gulf  stream. 

He  discovered  that  North-east  storms  begin  in  the  South-west. 

He  invented  the  invaluable  contrivance  by  which  a  fire  consumes  its  own 
smoke. 

He  made  important  discoveries  respecting  the  causes  of  the  most  univer- 
sal of  all  diseases — colds. 

He  pointed  out  the  advantage  of  building  ships  in  water-tight  compart- 
ments, taking  the  hint  from  the  Chinese. 

He  expounded  the  theory  of  navigation  which  is  now  universally  adopted 
by  intelligent  seamen,  and  of  which  a  charlatan  and  a  traitor  has  received  the 
credit. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  Revolution,  he  was  the  soul  of  the  party  whose 
sentiments  Thomas  Paine  spoke  in  '  Common  Sense.' 

In  Paris,  as  the  antidote  to  the  restless  distrust  of  Arthur  Lee,  and  the 
restless  vanity  of  John  Adams,  he  saved  the  alliance  over  and  over  again,  and 
brought  the  negotiations  for  peace  to  a  successful  close.  His  mere  presence 
in  Europe  was  a  moving  plea  for  the  rights  of  man. 

In  the  Convention  of  1787,  his  indomitable  good  humor  was,  probably, 
the  uniting  element,  wanting  which  the  Convention  would  have  dissolved 
without  having  done  its  work. 

His  last  labors  were  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  and  the  aid  of  its  emanci- 
pated victims. 

Having,  during  a  very  long  life,  instructed,  stimulated,  cheered,  amused, 
and  elevated  his  countrymen  and  all  mankind,  he  was  faithful  to  them  to  the 
end,  and  added  to  his  other  services  the  edifying  spectacle  of  a  calm,  cheer- 
ful, and  triumphant  death ;  leaving  behind  him  a  mass  of  writings,  full  of  his 
own  kindness,  humor,  and  wisdom,  to  perpetuate  his  influence,  and  sweeten 
the  life  of  coming  generations. 

Such  is  the  brief  record  of  the  more  conspicuous  actions  of  Benjamin 
Franklin. 

But  to  conclude.  We  find  that  several  fortunate  circumstances  in  the  lot 
of  Franklin  were  not  due  to  any  act  of  his  own ;  such  as  his  great  gifts,  his 
birth  in  a  pure  and  virtuous  family,  his  birth  in  large  America,  in  an  age  of 
free  inquiry,  and  his  early  opportunities  of  mental  culture.  But  we  have  ob- 
served that  the  enjoyment  of  all  these  advantages  did  not  make  him  a  happy 
or  a  virtuous  man,  or  an  orderly,  useful  member  of  society.  The  great  event 
in  his  life  was  his  deliberate  and  final  choice  to  dedicate  himself  to  virtue  and 
the  public  good.  This  was  his  own  act.  In  this  the  person  of  humblest 
endowments  may  imitate  him.  From  that  act  dates  the  part  of  his  career 
which  yielded  him  substantial  welfare,  and  which  his   countrymen  now  con- 


I'/o         LORD  BROUGHAM'S  JUDGMENT  OF   FRANKLIN. 

template  with  pleasure  and  gratitude.  It  made  a  man  of  him.  It  gave  him 
the  command  of  his  powers,  and  his  resources.  It  enabled  him  to  extract 
from  life  all  its  latent  good,  and  to  make  his  own  life  a  vast  addition  to  the  sum 
of  good  in  the  world. 

Men  have  lived  who  were  more  magnificently  endowed  than  Franklin. 
Men  have  lived  whose  lives  were  more  splendid  and  heroic  than  his.  If  the 
inhabitants  of  the  earth  were  required  to  select — to  represent  them  in  some 
celestial  congress  composed  of  the  various  orders  of  intelligent  beings — a  spe- 
cimen of  the  human  race,  and  we  should  send  a  Shakspeare,  the  celestials 
would  say,  He  is  one  of  us  ;  or  a  Napoleon,  the  fallen  angels  might  claim 
him.  But  if  we  desired  to  select  a  man  who  could  present  in  his  own  charac- 
ter the  largest  amount  of  human  worth  with  the  least  of  human  frailty,  and  in 
his  own  lot  on  earth  the  largest  amount  of  enjoyment  with  the  least  of  suffer- 
ing; one  whose  character  was  estimable  without  being  too  exceptionally 
good,  and  his  lot  happy  without  being  too  generally  unattainable  ;  one  wh< 
could  bear  in  his  letter  of  credence,  with  the  greatest  truth, 

This  is  a  Man,  and  his  life  on  earth  was  such  as  good  men  may  live, 

I  know  not  who,  of  the  renowned  of  all  ages,  we  could  more  fitly  choose  to 
represent  us  in  that  high  court  of  the  universe,  than  Benjamin  Franklin, 
printer,  of  Philadelphia. — Thus  far  Mr.  Par  ton. 

In  the  sober  judgment  of  that  most  learned  and  philosophical  of  England's 
modern  statesmen,  Lord  Brougham  thus  speaks  of  Franklin  : — '  One  of  the 
most  remarkable  men,  certainly,  of  our  times,  as  a  politician,  or  of  any  age, 
as  a  philosopher,  was  Franklin,  who  also  stands  alone  in  combining  together 
these  two  characters,  the  greatest  that  man  can  sustain,  and  in  this,  that  hav- 
ing borne  the  first  part  in  enlarging  science,  by  one  of  the  greatest  discoveries 
ever  made,  he  bore  the  second  part  in  founding  one  of  the  greatest  empires 
in  the  world. 

'  In  this  truly  great  man  every  thing  seems  to  concur  that  goes  towards 
the  constitution  of  exalted  merit.  First,  he  was  the  architect  of  his  own  for- 
tune. Born  in  the  humblest  station,  he  raised  himself  by  his  talents  and  his 
industry,  first  to  the  place  in  society  which  may  be  attained  with  the  help  only 
of  extraordinary  abilities,  great  application,  and  good  luck ;  but  next,  to  the 
loftier  heights  which  a  daring  and  happy  genius  alone  can  scale ;  and  the  poor 
printer's  boy  who,  at  one  period  of  his  life,  had  no  covering  to  shelter  his  head 
from  the  dews  of  night,  rent  in  twain  the  proud  dominion  of  England,  and 
lived  to  be  the  ambassador  of  a  commonwealth  which  he  had  formed,  at  the 
court  of  the  haughty  monarchs  of  France,  who  had  been  his  allies. 

'  In  domestic  life  he  was  faultless,  and  in  the  intercourse  of  society,  delight- 
ful. There  was  a  constant  good  humor  and  a  playful  wit,  easy,  and  of  high 
relish,  without  any  ambition  to  shine,  the  natural  fruit  of  his  lively  fancy,  his 
solid,  natural  good  sense,  and  his  cheerful  temper,  that  gave  his  conversation 
an  unspeakable  charm  and  alike  suited  every  circle,  from  the  humblest  to  the 


•vX- ^'V 


MIRABEAITS   EULOGY  ON  FRANKLIN.  17* 

most  elevated.  With  all  his  strong  opinions,  so  often  solemnly  declared,  so 
imperishably  recorded  in  his  deeds,  he  retained  a  tolerance  for  those  who  dif- 
fered with  him,  which  could  not  be  surpassed  in  men  whose  principles  hang 
so  loosely  about  them  as  to  be  taken  up  for  a  convenient  cloak,  and  laid 
down  when  found  to  impede  their  progress.  In  his  family  he  was  everything 
that  worth,  warm  affections,  and  sound  prudence  could  contribute  to  make  a 
man  both  useful  and  amiable,  respected  and  beloved.  In  religion,  he  would 
by  many  be  reckoned  a  latitudinarian  ;  yet  it  is  certain  that  his  mind  was  im- 
bued with  a  deep  sense  of  the  Divine  perfections,  a  constant  impression  of 
our  accountable  nature,  and  a  lively  hope  of  future  enjoyment.  Accordingly, 
his  death-bed,  the  test  of  both  faith  and  works,  was  easy  and  placid,  resigned 
and  devout ;  and  indicated  at  once  an  unflinching  retrospect  of  the  past,  and 
a  comfortable  assurance  of  the  future.' 

When  the  news  of  Franklin's  death  reached  France,  it  called  forth  emo- 
tions that  could  be  inspired  only  in  the  heart  of  the  most  generous  of  the 
nations,  and  the  one  that  knew  him  best.  On  the  eleventh  of  June,  at  the 
opening  of  the  National  Assembly,  the  great  Mirabeau  rose  and  said  : — 

1  Franklin  is  dead !  The  genius  that  freed  America,  and  poured  a  flood 
of  light  over  Europe,  has  returned  to  the  bosom  of  the  Divinity. 

4  The  sage  whom  two  worlds  claim  as  their  own,  the  man  for  whom  the 
history  of  science  and  the  history  of  empires  contend  with  each  other,  held, 
without  doubt,  a  high  rank  in  the  human  race. 

1  Too  long  have  political  cabinets  taken  formal  note  of  the  death  of  those 
who  were  great  only  in  their  funeral  panegyrics.  Too  long  has  the  etiquette 
of  courts  prescribed  hypocritical  mourning.  Nations  should  wear  mourning 
only  for  their  benefactors.  The  representatives  of  nations  should  recommend 
to  their  homage  none  but  the  heroes  of  humanity. 

I  The  Congress  has  ordained,  throughout  the  United  States,  a  mourning 
of  one  month  for  the  death  of  Franklin;  and,  at  this  moment  America  is 
paying  this  tribute  of  veneration  and  gratitude  to  one  of  the  fathers  of  her 
Constitution. 

4  Would  it  not  become  us,  gentlemen,  to  join  in  this  religious  act ;  to  bear 
a  part  in  this  homage,  rendered,  in  the  face  of  the  world,  both  to  the  rights  of 
man,  and  to  the  philosopher  who  has  most  contributed  to  extend  their  sway 
over  the  whole  earth?  Antiquity  would  have  raised  altars  to  this  mighty 
genius,  who  to  the  advantage  of  mankind,  compassing  in  his  mind  the  heavens 
and  the  earth,  was  able  to  restrain  alike  thunderbolts  and  tyrants.  Europe, 
enlightened  and  free,  owes  at  least  a  token  of  remembrance  and  regret  to 
one  of  the  greatest  men  who  have  ever  been  engaged  in  the  service  of  philos- 
ophy and  of  liberty. 

I I  propose  that  it  be  decreed  that  the  National  Assembly,  during  three 
days,  shall  wear  mourning  for  Benjamin  Franklin.' 

Rochefoucauld  and  Lafayette  both  sprang  to  their  feet  to  second  the  pro 
posal :  but  there  was  no  need  of  seconding  it ;  it  was  carried  by  acclama  .ioa 


172  JONATHAN  EDWARDS'    OF   CONNECTICUT. 

The  Assembly  further  decreed,  that  the  address  of  Mirabeau  should  be  printed, 
and  that  the  president,  M.  Sieyes,  should  communicate  to  the  Congress  of 
the  United  States  the  resolution  which  the  National  Assembly  had  passed. 
M.  Sieyes  performed  the  duty  assigned  him  by  addressing  a  letter  to  the 
President  of  the  United  States,  which  was  full  of  the  feeling  of  the  hour. 

Jonathan  Edwards.  Born  in  East  Windsor,  Conn.,  October  5,  1703. 
Died  at  Princeton,  New  Jersey,  March  22,  1758. — Dr.  Griswold  opens  his 
Prose  Writers  of  America  ■  with  the  following  words : — 'The  first  man  of  the 
world  during  the  second  quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  Jonathan 
Edwards  of  Connecticut.  As  a  theologian  Robert  Hall  and  Thomas  Chal- 
mers admit  that  he  was  the  greatest  who  has  lived  in  the  Christian  ages ;  and 
as  a  metaphysician  Dugald  Stewart2  and  Sir  James  Mackintosh  agree  that 
he  was  never  surpassed.  In  Great  Britain,  and  on  the  continent  of  Europe 
men  disavowed  belief  in  some  of  his  doctrines,  but  confessed  that  they  had 
only  protests  to  oppose  to  them :  Edwards  had  anticipated  and  refuted  all 
arguments.  Adopting  some  of  his  principles,  others  built  up  for  themselves 
great  reputations  by  perverting  them,  or  deducing  from  them  illegitimate  con- 
clusions. In  whatever  light  he  is  regarded,  he  commands  our  admiration. 
He  was  unequalled  in  intellect,  and  unsurpassed  in  virtue.  Bacon  was  de- 
scribed as  the  '  wisest  and  the  meanest  of  mankind  ;  •  but  Edwards,  not  infe- 
rior to  the  immortal  Chancellor  in  genius,  suffers  not  even  an  accusation  of 
anything  unbecoming  a  gentleman,  a  philosopher,  or  a  Christian. 

'Born  in  a  country  which  was  still  almost  a  wilderness;  educated  in  a 
college  which  had  scarcely  a  local  habitation ;  settled,  a  large  part  of  his 

1  I  quote  from  the  new  and  excellent  edition  of  this  ble.     Instead  of  puzzling  or  imposing  on   others,  he 

work  from   the    press  of  Porter  &  Coates,   Philadel-  tries    to    satisfy   his    own  mind.     .     .     .     Far    from 

phia,  1870,  which  contains  an  additional  and  able  sur-  taunting  his  adversaries,  he   endeavors  with   all   his 

vey  of  the  progress  of  American  Literature  by  Prof,  might  to  explain  difficulties.     .     .     .     His  anxiety  to 

Dillingham,  executed  with  care  and  ability.  clear  up  the  scruples  of  others  is  equal  to  his  firmness 

3  '  In  the  New  World,'  said  Dugald  Stewart,  '  the  in  maintaining  his  own  opinion.' 
state  of  society  and  of  manners  has  not  hitherto  been  Rev.  Dr.  Alexander — of  Princeton  fame — has  de- 
so  favorable  to  abstract  science  as  to  pursuits  which  scribed  his  character  as  a  preacher.  '  He  was  corn- 
have  come  home  directly  to  the  business  of  human  manding  as  a  pulpit  teacher,  not  for  grace  of  person ; 
life.  There  is,  however,  one  metaphysician  of  whom  he  was  slender  and  shy ;  not  for  elocution ;  his  voice 
America  has  to  boast,  who,  in  logical  acuteness  and  was  thin  and  weak  ;  for  any  trick  of  style  ;  no  man 
subtlety,  does  not  yield  to  any  disputant  bred  in  the  more  disdained  and  trampled  on  it : — but  from  his 
universities  of  Europe.  I  need  not  say  that  I  allude  immense  preparation,  long  forethought,  sedulous  unit- 
to  Jonathan  Edwards.  ^  But  at  the  time  when  he  ing  of  every  word,  touching  earnestness  and  holy  life, 
wrote,  the  state  of  America  was  more  favorable  than  He  was  not  a  man  of  company  ;  he  seldom  visited  his 
it  is  now,  or  can  for  a  long  period  be  expected  to  be,  hearers.  Yet  there  was  no  man  whose  mental  power 
to  such  inquiries  as  those  which  engaged  his  atten-  was  greater.  Common  consent  set  him  at  the  head  of 
tion  ;  inquiries,  by  the  way,  to  which  his  thoughts  his  profession.  Even  in  a  time  of  raptures  and  fiery 
were  evidently  turned,  less  by  the  impulse  of  specula-  excitement  he  lost  no  influence.  The  incident  is 
tive  curiosity  than  by  his  anxiety  to  defend  the  theo-  familiar  of  his  being  called  on  a  sudden  to  take  the 
logical  system  in  which  he  had  been  educated,  and  place  of  Whitefield,  the  darling  of  the  people,  who 
to  which  he  was  most  conscientiously  and  zealously  failed  to  appear  when  a  multitude  were  gathered  to 
attached.  The  effect  of  this  anxiety  in  sharpening  his  hear  him.  Edwards,  unknown  to  most,  in  person, 
faculties,  and  in  keeping  his  polemic  vigilance  con-  with  unfeigned  reluctance,  such  as  a  vainer  man  might 
stantly  on  the  alert,  may  be  traced  in  every  step  of  feel,  rose  before  a  disappointed  assembly  and  proceed- 
his  argument.'  ed  with  feeble  mariner  to  read  from  his  manuscript. 

Hazlitt,  whose  '  Principles  of  Human  Action'  show  In  a  little  time  the  audience  was  hushed;    but  this 

Vim  to  have  been  a  close  and  original  student  of  men-  was  not  all.     Before  they  were  aware,  they  were  atten- 

tal  phenomena,  and  whose  knowledge  of  metaphysical  tive  and  soon  enchained.  As  was  then  common,  one  and 

authors  entitles  him  to  an  authoritative  opinion  on  the  another  in  the  outskirts  would  arise  and  stand  ;  num- 

subject,  says  of  the   'Treatise  on  the  Will,'  and  its  bers  arose  and  stood ;  they  came  forward,  they  pressed 

author  :     '  Having  produced  him  the  Americans  need  upon  the  centre  ;  the  whole  assembly  rose  ;  and  befora 

not  despair  of   their    metaphysicians.      We   do    not  he  concluded,  sobs  burst  from  the  convulsed   throng, 

scruple  to  say  that  he  is  one  of  the  acutest,  most  pow-  It  was  the  power  of  fearful  argument.' — Duyckinck's 

erful,  and  of  all  reasoners  the  most  conscientious  and  Cyclopaedia  of  Am.  Literature*  vol.  i.  pp.  94-95. 
sincere.     His  closeness  and  candor  are  alike  admira- 


ANCESTRY  OF  EDWARDS.  173 

life  over  a  church  upon  the  confines  of  civilization,  and  the  rest  of  it  in  the 
very  midst  of  barbarism,  in  the  humble  but  honorable  occupation  of  a  mis- 
sionary, he  owed  nothing  to  adventitious  circumstances.  With  a  fragile 
body,  a  fine  imagination,  and  a  spirit  the  most  gentle  that  ever  thrilled  in  the 
presence  of  the  beautiful,  he  seemed  of  all  men  the  least  fitted  for  the  great 
conflict  in  which  he  engaged.  But  He,  who,  giving  to  Milton  the  Dorian 
reed,  sent  out  his  seraphim  to  enrich  him  with  utterance  and  knowledge, 
with  fire  from  the  same  altar  purified  the  lips  of  Edwards,  to  teach  that  *  true 
religion  consists  in  holy  affections,'  the  spring  of  all  which  is  '  a  love  of  divine 
things /^r  their  own  beauty  and  sweetness?" 

The  two  men  who  have  put  forth  the  greatest  influence  on  the  religious 
thought  and  character  of  America,  are  Jonathan  Edwards  and  John  Wesley. 
It  may  be  more  proper  to  say  that  the  theological  and  metaphysical  mind  of 
New  England  was  moulded  almost  entirely  by  Edwards ;  while  the  religious 
feeling  of  the  masses — especially  in  the  less  thickly  settled  regions  of  the  South 
and  West — was  permanently  tinged  and  controlled  by  Wesley.  But  together 
they  have  held  a  mightier  sway  over  the  religious  classes,  than  all  the  other 
theologians  of  the  continent. 

Whitefield  was  ■  the  Prince  of  preachers.'  Panting  for  a  new  and  broadei 
field  for  Christian  philanthropy,  he  reached  Savannah  only  six  years  after  Ogle- 
thorpe had  founded  it,  and  at  the  age  of  twenty-three  began  his  immense  labors. 
An  Evangelist  of  fire,  he  went  like  Peter  the  Hermit  throughout  the  Colonies, 
melting  vast  crowds — men  and  women  alike — by  the  irresistible  power  of  his 
eloquence.  But  that  magic  sway  was  limited  chiefly  to  those  who  heard  him, 
and  the  wand  fell  from  his  hand  at  death.1  But  when  Edwards  and  Wesley  laid 
off  their  mortality,  their  empire  had  only  just  begun. 

Like  so  many  of  the  illustrious  men  of  the  Colonial  times,  he  was  fortunate  in 
his  ancestry.  He  sprang  from  the  best  stock  of  the  two  Englands — the  Old 
and  the  New — which  meant  the  best  on  the  earth.  They  were  tall,  stalwart, 
broad-shouldered,  handsome,  long-lived.  They  were  men  of  massive,  active 
brain,  ripe  learning,  sensitive  temperament}  exalted  reverence,  and  coura- 
geous manhood.  '  We  attach  a  good  deal  of  importance  to  these  facts  ;  for 
however  common  it  may  be  in  Democracies,  to  speak  slightingly  of  noble  descent, 
yet  all  men  of  sense  are  well  aware  that  nothing  more  valuable  can  be  inher- 
ited than  good,  sound  blood, — strong,  healthy  constitutions, — ample  and 
vigorous  frames,  well  put  together, — unless  indeed  it  may  be  what  is  so  gen 
erally  allied  to  all  these  qualities,  strong  healthy  brains,  vigorous  intellect, 
and  manly  character.' a  * 

1  Four  generations  back,  on  his  father's  side,  his  ancestor  was  a  clergyman  of 
the  Established  Church  in  London  in  the  time  of  Elizabeth.  Hiss  on  emigra- 
ted to  Hartford,  in  Connecticut,  in  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century.     He 

1   George  Whitefield  established  an  Orphan  House  grave  in  New  England, 

at  Savannah,  after  the  model  of  the  one  at  Halle,  and  a  Lester's  Life  and  Public  Services  of  Charlei 

sustained  it  by  the  contributions  which  his  eloquence  ex-  Sumner,  one  vol.  8vo,  690  pp.,  Fifth  Edition,  United 

torted.    His  '  House  of  Mercy'  lived   and  flourished,  a  States  Publishing  Company,  New  York,  1874. 
great   blessing,  until  his   death  in  1770.     He  made  his 


J 74  LIFE  AND   GENIUS  OF  EDWARDS. 

was  a  merchant,  as  was  also  his  son  Richard,  who  superadded  to  that  worldl) 
calling  a  life  of  eminent  piety.  The  next  in  descent  was  the  Rev.  Timothy 
Edwards,  the  father  of  Jonathan.  He  was  a  graduate  of  Harvard,  and  the 
first  minister  of  East  Windsor.  In  the  old  French  War  he  accompanied  ar 
expedition  as  chaplain  on  its  way  to  Canada.  He  married  the  daughter  of  the 
Rev.  Solomon  Stoddard,  of  Northampton,  with  whom  he  lived  more  than 
sixty-three  years,  when  she  died,  in  her  ninety-ninth  year.  This  lady,  the 
mother  of  Jonathan  Edwards,  is  spoken  of  as  possessed  of  superior  force  of 
understanding,  and  refinement  of  character.'  ■ 

Jonathan  Edwards  was  the  only  son  in  a  family  of  eleven  children.  To 
the  genial  and  inspiring  influence  of  those  ten  gifted  and  noble  sisters,  his  best 
biographer 2  attributes  many  of  the  graces  which  adorned  his  beautiful  character. 
But  with  no  attempt  to  trace  his  history,  I  shall  only  glance  at  his  chief  charac- 
teristics. By  so  much  as  the  genius  of  Edwards  rose  above  the  other 
great  men  of  his  time,  by  so  much  did.  he  surpass  them  in  the  greatness 
of  his  intellectual  creations.  In  so  far  as  his  conceptions  of  the  attributes  of 
God  towered  above  those  of  his  fellows,  just  so  far  did  he  transcend  them  in 
the  grandeur  of  his  spiritual  delineations. 

Sin  was  to  him  the  deepest  crime.  To  a  father  of  absolute  beneficence, 
it  was  the  darkest  filial  impiety.  To  a  sovereign,  supreme  treason.  As 
against  the  author  of  all  law,  chaos — as  against  infinite  love,  fiendish  hate- 
as  against  supreme  beauty,  the  ugliest  deformity — as  against  unbounded 
beneficence,  unmixed  malevolence.  Any  departure  from  absolute  purity  of 
character,  war  against  the  King  of  kings.  So  fearfully  exacting,  so  unswerving 
and  relentless  was  the  standard  by  which  each  soul  must  be  judged. 

By  so  much  as  his  spiritual  perceptions  of  the  guilt  of  sin  eclipsed  the  fee- 
ble ideas  of  others,  by  so  much  did  his  views  of  its  consequences.  If  rebel- 
lion against  God  was  an  infinite  crime,  just  as  immeasurable  must  be  its  pun- 
ishment. If  holiness  on  earth  partook  of  the  purity  of  heaven,  so,  too,  must 
the  joys  of  the  redeemed,  and  the  sufferings  of  the  damned  trend  on  the  infi- 
nite. His  imagination  clothed  the  regions  of  the  lost  with  horrors  that  never 
found  a  place  even  in  the  august  splendors  of  Dante's  Hell.  Like  the  Ital- 
ian poet,  he  invoked  physical  imagery,  for  he  could  use  no  other  that  men 
would  understand.  In  reading  his  sermon  on  Sinners  in  the  Hand  of  an 
Angry  God,  we  do  not  wonder  that,  as  it  fell  from  the  white  lips  of  the  majes 
tic  prophet,  it  drove  his  gentler  hearers  to  the  verge  of  madness. 

1  Duyckinck's  Cyclopaedia  of  American  Literature,  taste,  of  industry,  and  of  religion  in  all  its  loveliness, 

Edited  to  date  by  M.  Laird  Simons.     This  work,  which  more  conspicuous  than  in  that  of  which  he  was  a  mem- 

B  receiving  such  new  value  through  Mr.  Simons'  labors,  ber.     There  is  no  human  influence  better  adapted  to 

is  being  issued  in  superior  style,  in  monthly  numbers,  by  exert  a  happy  power  in  forming  the  character  of  a  young 

T.  Ellwood  Zell,  of  Philadelphia,  and  demands  a  place  man  than  the  society  of  cultivated,  refined,  and  virtuous 

in  all  Libraries.  sisters.     In  this  respect,  young  Edwards  was  peculiar- 

a  Rev.  Dr.  Samuel  Miller,  who  wrote  for  Tared  ly  favored.     Himself  the  only  son,  associated  with  ten 

Sparks'    American    Biography   an    admirable   life  of  sisters  of  enlightened,  polished  minds,  and  engaged,  to 

Edwards,  says,  in  speaking  of  the  home  of  his  childhood  a    considerable  extent,  in  the  same  studies  with  him- 

and  youth  : — '  His  father's  family  seems  to  have  been  self,    he  manifested  all  that  softness,  refinement,   and 

a  scene  of  the  most  pure  and  refined  intellectual  and  moral  correctness  which  the  society  of  such  sisters  wai 

moral  influence,   as  well  as  of  the  most  sound  and  en-  eminently  adapted  to  impress.     He  was  in  a  school 

lightened  piety.     Perhaps  in  no  domestic  circfe  in  the  fitted    to  impart  the  finest  moral  finish  to  intellectual 

land  were  habits  of  thought,  of  intelligence,  of  literary  culture."— p.  ia. 


HIS  MORAL  AND  INTELLECTUAL   CHARACTER.  175 

But  to  understand  Edwards,  we  must  recall  his  times.  The  fires  of  the 
Puritan  days  were  burning  low  on  the  altars.  The  deep,  earnest  \  iety  of  the 
Pilgrims  had  well-nigh  disappeared.  It  was  a  season  of  spiritual  death,  and 
the  hour  had  dome  for  a  spiritual  resurrection.  The  standard  of  the  Lord 
of  hosts  was  trailing  in  the  dust.  '  The  wheels  drave  heavily.'  He  would  see 
the  winged  coursers  flying  to  the  rescue  ;  and  in  the  agony  of  his  spirit  he 
cried  out,  '  O.  God  !  why  tarry  the  wheels  of  thy  chariot  ? ' 

None  but  earthquakes  could  rend  the  tombs  of  the  dead — none  but  words 
of  flame  could  reach  the  ears  of  the  drugged  sleepers.  The  fervor  of  primitive 
zeal  had  passed  away;  the  long  waveless  level  of  commonplace  had  been 
reached.  Even  the  church  of  the  Puritans  had  sunk  to  the  foul  compromise 
of  a  Half-way  covenant,  which  to  Edwards's  mind  was  '  a  covenant  with  hell.' 
His  great  mission  was  to  lead  men  back  to  God  ;  and  from  his  pulpit  as 
from  a  judgment  throne,  he  pronounced  the  words  of  doom  to  the  ungodly. 
Like  the  prophet  of  the  desert,  he  hailed  men  to  ?  flee  from  the  wrath  to 
come.'  He  did  for  his  time  what  Elijah  did  for  the  worship  of  the  true  God 
— what  Dante  did  for  Poetry — what  Petrarch  did  for  Love.  He  cast  the  aw- 
ful shadows  of  the  life  to  come,  over  the  dull  landscape  of  an  irreverent  age. 

A  piety  as  austere  as  a  monk's  of  the  Flagellation,  and  as  tender  as 
Fenelon's  :  an  intellect  as  pure  as  Plato's :  an  acuteness  in  dialectics  sur- 
passing the  schoolmen's,  and  a  reason  as  clear  as  our  northern  winter 
starlight — and  withal,  the  heart  of  a  little  child  in  the  arms  of  Jesus : — a 
simple  worshipper  of  simple  truth. 

His  loyalty  to  God  was  stronger  than  death, — or  even  life,  which  is  so 
infinitely  stronger.  When  the  people  among  whom  he  dwelt  went  after 
strange  gods,  and  like  Ahab,  forgot  the  God  of  their  fathers,  he  turned  to  the 
heathen  in  the  wilds  of  western  Massachusetts,  as  Abraham  left  the  home  of 
his  childhood  to  go  into  a  land  that  God  would  show  him :  as  Paul  turned 
from  the  heartless  formalism  of  Jewish  Phariseeism  to  the  warm  embrace  of 
the  pagan,  but  unspoiled  Gentiles. 

His  low-browed  '  study'  was  the  library  of  the  scholar — the  altar  of  a  saint — 
the  cell  of  a  monk  of  the  Middle- Ages.  When  he  came  forth  from  that  awful 
seclusion,  his  face  shone,  for  he  had  been  talking  with  God  ! 

But  for  such  men  coming  up  at  intervals,  neither  Philosophy,  Letters,- 
Art,  Love,  nor  the  worship  of  the  true  God  would  ever  have  been  born — 
without  them,  they  would  die.  They  are  the  landmarks  of  the  Ages  :  we 
reckon  Time  from  Abraham,  Cyrus,  Cadmus,  the  Builders  of  the  Pyramids ; 
from  Romulus,  and  Caesar,  and  Christ. 

He  dedicated  learning  to  the  holiest  purposes.  He  kindled  the  flames  of 
an  exalted,  evangelical,  manly  piety  ;  and  those  fires  were  never  to  go  out 
till  over  the  ashes  of  all  superstition  and  bewildering  man-made  creeds,  was 
to  rise  the  fair  structure  of  Christian  Spiritualism,  which  is  to  be  the  commoc 
Religion  of  the  whole  earth. 

Edwards  reached  the  scene  of  the  mature  labors  which  he  had  marked 


176  EDWARDS  AND    WEBSTER    COMPARED. 

out  for  the  rest  of  his  life,  only  to  die  at  the  early  age  of  fifty-five.1  Bui 
he  had  lived  long  enough.  His  work  was  done  ;  the  fruit  of  his  nighty 
labors  was  all  secure ;  it  was  to  be  the  bread  of  life  for  all  coming  time. 
From  his  virile  loins,  and  from  the  bosom  of  the  beautiful  and  glorious  Sarah 
Pierpoint — every  whit  his  equal,2  have  sprung  five  generations  of  fair  women 
and  brave  men,  of  whom  upwards  of  five  thousand  are  living  to-day — while 
the  mighty  host  of  his  spiritual  offspring  in  all  lands  on  earth,  and  in  all 
climes  in  heaven,  no  man  can  number.  .  The  frowning  castle  of  his  theology 
may  be  slowly  undermined  by  the  stream  of  a  Christianity  growing  broader 
with  time,  but  the  sceptre  of  his  logic  will  never  be  broken. 

Among  the  vast  cluster  of  the  great  and  good  whose  ashes  sanctify  the 
genial  soil  of  the  Campo  Santo  of  Princeton,  the  grave  of  Edwards  is  ap- 
proached with  the  deepest  veneration ;  and  to  it,  as  to  some  sacred  shrine, 
will  pilgrims  from  every  land  reverently  bend  their  pious  steps,  while  the 
memory  of  genius  dedicated  to  humanity  and  to  God,  shall  endure  among 


The  foremost  men  of  his  time,  both  in  America  and  Europe,  regarded  the 
author  of  the  l7iquiry  into  the  Freedom  of  the  Will  as  the  mightiest  intellect 
which  had  appeared  on  this  continent.  That  judgment  has  not  been  reversed. 
After  him,  the  country  has  produced  but  one  man  with  whom  he  can  be  fitly 
compared  in  intellectual  strength.  Indeed,  it  seems  by  no  means  unlikely 
that  when  the  future  shall  be  called  on  to  designate  the  two  grandest  minds 
which  have  shone  on  this  hemisphere, — one  the  representative  of  the  eighteenth, 
and  the  other  of  the  nineteenth  century, — the  choice  will  fall  on  Jonathan  Ed- 
wards of  Connecticut,  and  Daniel  Webster  of  New  Hampshire.  They  stood  just 
one  hundred  years  apart  in  the  noontide  of  their  splendor.  The  one  swayed 
the  judgments  of  the  statesmen  of  his  times — a  giant  in  the  affairs  of  this  life 
— a  counsellor  for  nations.  The  other  a  colossus  in  the  affairs  of  the  life  to 
come.  One  the  first  man  of  his  age.  The  other  the  man  for  all  the  ages. 
The  Sage  of  Marshfield  was  the  interpreter  of  the  political  system  of  the  New 
World.     The  metaphysician  of  New  England,  the  interpreter  of  immortality 

1  Edwards's  death  was  caused  inconsequence  of  sweet  delight,  and  that  she  hardly  cares  for  anything  ex- 
inoculation  for  small-pox,  which  prevailed  in  a  malig-  cept  to  meditate  on  him  ;  that  she  expects,  after  a  while, 
nant  form  in  the  neighborhood.  He  came  from  a  long-  to  be  received  up  where  he  is,  to  be  raised  out  of  the 
lived  race  on  both  sides,  and  but  for  the  seclusion  of  world  and  caught  up  into  heaven  ;  being  assured  that  he 
his  monastic  life,  so  unrelentingly  devoted  to  hard  loves  her  too  well  to  let  her  remain  at  a  distance  from 
study,  he  would  have  been  a  man  of  vast  physical  him  always.  There  she  is  to  dwell  with  him,  and  to  be 
power,  for  he  was  fully  six  feet  high,  and  symmetri-  ravished  with  his  love  and  delight  forever.  Therefore, 
cally  formed.  But  from  twelve  to  sixteen  hours  a  day  if  you  present  all  the  world  before  her,  with  the  richest 
of  such  application  as  he  kept  up  for  forty  years  would  of  its  treasures,  she  disregards  it  and  cares  not  for  it, 
have  wasted  the  physical  strength  of  a  Hercules.  and  is  unmindful  of  any  pain  or  affliction.     She  has  a 

2  In  July,  1726,  he  married  Miss  Sarah  Pierrepont,  strange  sweetness  in  her  mind,  and  singular  purity  in 
the  daughter  of  a  clergyman  of  strong  clerical  connec-  her  affections  ;  is  most  just  and  conscientious  in  all  her 
tions,  and  a  young  lady  of  eighteen,  of  unusual  beauty,  conduct,  and  you  could  not  persuade  her  to  do  anything 
The  spiritual  description  of  her  gentle  habits,  written  wrong  or  sinful,  if  you  would  give  her  all  the  world,  lest 
by  Edwards,  apparently  on  reports  of  her  excellence  she  should  offend  this  Great  Being.  She  is  of  a  won- 
brought  to  him  when  she  was  but  thirteen  years  of  age,  derful  sweetness,  calmness,  and  universal  benevolence 
is  the  unconscious  admiration  of  the  lover  in  the  saint,  of  mind  ;  especially  after  this  Great  God  has  manifested 
'They  say,'  writes  on  a  blank  leaf  the  pure-minded  himself  to  her  mind.  She  will  sometimes  go  about  from 
young  man  of  twenty,  '  that  there  is  a  young  lady  in  place  to  place,  singing  sweetly,  and  seems  to  be  always 
New  Haven  who  is  beloved  of  that  Great  Being,  who  full  of  joy  and  pleasure,  and  no  one  knows  for  what, 
made  and  rules  the  world,  and  that  there  are  certain  She  loves  to  be  alone,  walking  in  the  fields  and  groves, 
leasons  in  which  this  Great  Being,  in  some  way  or  other  and  seems  to  have  some  one  invisible  always  ccnversing 
invisible,  comes  to  her  and  fills  her  mind  with  exceeding  with  her  ! ' 


JOKN    W-ESI/E-ST 


JOHN   WESLEY  IN   WESTMINSTER   ABBEY.  i77 

-—but  both  masters  of  all  the  passions  and  powers  of  the  human  soul,— both 
so  mantled  with  majesty  that  as  they  moved  among  their  fellows,  the  instinc- 
tive reverence  of  men  found  for  them  but  one  epithet — they  were  Godlike. 
Comprehending  much' of  the  awful  magnificence  of  the  Infinite,  and  much  more 
of  the  divinity  of  man,  their  great  hearts  went  out  in  earnest  longings  for  the 
temporal  and  eternal  elevation  of  the  race.  Alike  they  worshipped  the  grand, 
the  beautiful,  the  enduring.  Neither  met  his  equal — for  the  two  never  met 
here.  But  in  eternity  they  grasped  each  other's  hands  as  brothers.  In  moral 
splendor  Edwards  has  had  few  peers  in  all  the  ages  of  the  Christian  Faith. 

John  Wesley.  Born  June  28,  1703.  Died  March  2,  1791. — One  by 
one,  the  ashes  or  the  names  of  England's  greatest  men  find  their  repose  or 
monuments  in  Westminster  Abbey.1  A  site  has  finally  been  appropriated 
there  for  a  monument  to  the  founder  of  Methodism.  If  to  have  vindicated  a 
title  to  be  admitted  to  the  company  of  the  natural  kings  of  the  earth,  opens 
the  gates  of  that  Pantheon,  John  Wesley's  claim  will  never  be  disputed  ;  for 
he  holds  to-day  a  peaceful  and  unquestioned  sway  over  the  hearts  of  twenty 
millions  of  Christian  worshippers.  They  are  found  amongst  all  nations,  but 
chiefly  where  the  English  tongue  is  spoken.  Of  Wesley's  influence,  Southey, 
his  partial  but  charming  biographer,  says,  '  I  consider  Wesley  as  the  most 
influential  mind  of  the  last  century — the  man  who  will  have  produced  the 
greatest  effects  centuries,  or  perhaps  millenniums  hence,  if  the  present  race 
of  men  shall  continue  so  long.'  — ■ — - — ?*F. 

Although  Wesley  was  an  Englishman  by  blood,  birth,  and  education,  and 
spent  but  two  years  in  America,  and  even  his  mission  to  Georgia  turned  out 
a  failure,  yet  he  is  pre-eminently  a  subject  for  American  biography,  for  more 
than  two-thirds  of  his  living  disciples  are  citizens  of  the  United  States,  and 
'  to  Methodism  more  than  to  any  other  one  thing  it  is  owing  that  our  Western 
States  grew  up  without  passing  through  a  period  of  semi-barbarism.'  a 

1  This  is  the  great  treasure-house  of  England.     If  blow  aimed  against  liberty  by  the  oppressors  of  the 

every  record  on  earth  besides  were  blotted  out,  and  the  race. 

memory  of  the  living  should  fade  away,  the  stranger  There  is  not  a  great  author  here  who  did  not  write 

could  still  in  Westminster  Abbey  write   the  history  of  for  us  ;  not  a  man  of  science  who  did  not  investigate 

the  past ;  for  England's  records  are  here ;    from  the  truth  for  us ;  we  have  received  advantage  from  every 

rude  and  bloody  escutcheons  of  the  ancient  Briton,  to  hour  of  toil  that  ever  made  these  good  and  great  men 

the  ensigns  of  Norman  chivalry  ;  and  from  these  to  ad-  weary.     A  wanderer  from  the  most  distant  and  barbar- 

miralty  stars,    and  civic  honors.     The  changes  which  ous  nation  on  earth  cannot  come  here,  without  finding 

civilization  has  made  in  its  progress  through  the  world,  the  graves  of  his  benefactors.     Those  who  love  science 

have   left   their   impressions   upon    these    stones    and  and  truth,  and  long  for  the  day  when  perfect  freedom 

marbles.     On  the  monument  where  each   great   man  of  thought  and  action  shall  be  the  common  heritage  of 

rests,   his   age  has  uttered  its  language  ;  and  among  man,  will  feel  grateful,  as  they  stand  under  these  arches, 

such    numbers  of  the  dead,  there   is  the  language  of  for  all  the  struggles,  and  all  the  trials  to  enlighten  and 

many  ages.     England  speaks  from  its  barbarity  in  the  emancipate  the  world,  which  the  great,  who  here  rest 

far-off  time,  before  the  day-spring  of  embellishing  Art —  from  their  labors,  have  so  nobly  endured. 
its  revolutions,  with  their  earnest  struggles  to  leave  the  And,  above  all,  the  scholar,  who  has  passed  his  best 

past   and    reach    the   future — while    the   later   shrines  years  in  study,  will  here  find  the  graves  of  his  Teachers, 

breathe  the  spirit  of  England's  newest  civilization.  He  has  long  worshipped  their  genius  ;  he  has  gathered 

Each  generation  has  laid  some  of  its  illustrious  ones  inspiration  and    truth  from  their  writings;   they  have 

here  ;  and  it  is  no  wonder  that  there  is  not  a  spot  to  made   his    solitary  hours,  which   to  other   men    are  a^ 

which  an  Englishman  rums  his  eye  with  so  much  pride,  dreary   waste,  like    the   magical    gardens   of  Arm:da, 

as  to  Westminster  Abbey;  nor  a  spot  the  traveller  so  ' whose  enchantments  arose  amid  solitude,  and  whose 

well  loves  to  visit.  solitude  was  everywhere  among   those  enchantments.' 

One  cannot  but  feel  both  gratitude  and  indignation  The  scholar  may  wish  to  shed  his  tears  alone,  but  he 
here  :  gratitude  for  every  noble  effort  in  behalf  of  cannot  stand  by  the  graves  of  his  masters  in  West- 
humanity,  civilization,  liberty,  and  truth,  made  by  these  minster  Abbey  without  weeping  ;  they  are  tears  of  love 
sleepers;  indignation  at  every  base  deed,  every  effort  and  gratitude. — Lester's  Glory  and  Shame  of  Eug 
to  quench  the  light  of  science,  or  destroy  freedom  of  land,  vol.  i.  p.  90.  x 
thought ;  every  outrage  inflicted  upon  man  ;  and  every  *  One  of  the  most  interesting  articks  which  has 
12 


*78  EARLY  LIFE  AND  STUDIES  OF   WESLEY. 

His  father  was  a  learned,  devout  and  hard-working  clergyn.an  of  the 
Church  of  England,  and  the  son  was  destined  to  the  same  profession.  With 
all  the  facilities  which  Oxford  could  afford,  his  rare  talents  and  severe  appli- 
cation left  all  rivals  behind  him  in  every  field  of  learning  he  entered.  He 
passed  from  Latin  and  Greek  to  Hebrew  and  Arabic,  became  familiar  with 
French,  and  excelled  in  mathematics.  Eminently  handsome,  well  bred,  and  of 
genial  manners ;  brilliant  in  conversation,  fond  of  society,  free  from  any  asceti- 
cism, and  mingling  warmly  with  the  world ;  with  views  made  large  and  a  spirit 
made  liberal  by  vast  reading  and  extensive  observation  ;  endowed  with  a  strong 
and  vivid  imagination,  and  a  keen  appreciation  of  praise,  he  would  seem  to 
have  found  in  oratory,  poetry  and  love,  the  highest  fields  for  the  exertion  of 
his  wonderful  gifts  j  and  we  find  these  tendencies  coloring  all  his  future  life. 

Overflowing  with  such  munificent  capabilities,  it  became  a  matter  of  no 
little  consequence  to  the  world  what  direction  they  were  to  take,  for  the 
temporal  and  eternal  fortunes  of  more  millions  of  men  were  to  be  determined 
by  his  movements,  than  have  hung  upon  half  the  great  battle-fields  of  history. 
The  broad  fields  through  which  the  stream  of  his  influence  was  to  flow,  would 
either  wave  with  luxuriance,  or  be  swept  with  desolation.  I  will  snatch  from 
my  unwilling  limits  one  sibylline  leaf  for  the  incidents  which  decided  Wesley's 
career.  These  being  understood,  all  the  mystery  of  this  grand  but  otherwise 
incomprehensible  life  disappears. 

Wesley's  earnest  religious  experiences  began  at  Oxford ;  there  his  char- 
acter was  formed.  Becoming  a  member,  and  soon  the  leader  of  a  band  of 
students  who  undertook  a  religious  life  on  system,  and  who  thereby  earned  the 
glorious  and  eternal  title  of  Methodists,  he  first  gave  indications  of  that 
superb  genius  for  control,  in  which  he  fell  not  a  hair's  breadth  short  of  his 
great  prototype,  Ignatius  Loyola.  Like  many  other  ingenuous  young  men 
of  that  period,  who  afterwards  gave  \  a  resurrection  and  a  life '  to  the  religion 
of  England,  he  lamented  the  cold  formalism  of  the  times.  The  Established 
Church  still  stood  firm  on  its  well-secured  foundations,  and  its  worship  was 
maintained  in  all  its  stateliness.  But  the  spirit  of  Christianity  no  longer 
animated  the  ecclesiastical  body.  The  priest  still  ministered  at  the  altar,  but 
the  sacred  fire  had  gone  out.  Through  the  fretted  vault  '  the  pealing  anthem ' 
still  'swelled  the  note  of  praise:'  'the  long  drawn  aisles'  were  filled  with 
spectators,  but  the  worshippers  were  not  there. 

All  this  could  not  satisfy  the  longings  of  such  a  soul  as  John  Wesley's. 
He  turned  away  from  it  unsatisfied,  and  sought  the  more  congenial  society  of 
the  spiritual  Moravians.     Soon  after  his  return  from  America,  he  visited  their 

recently  enriched  our  Periodical  Literature,  was  printed  many  more — fifteen  millions  in  all.     Thus  one- fifth  of 

in   the   February   No. — 1874 — of  Sheldon's    Galaxy,  all  who  speak  our  language  are  directly  moulded,  for 

from  the  facile  and  racy  pen  of  Mr.  Alfred  H.  Guern-  this  life   and   the  life  to   come,  by  Methodism.     We 

sey,  entitled  John  Wesley — from  which  I  borrow  some  doubt  if  any  other  Protestant  communion  really  num- 

illustrations  :  bers  as  many.     The  established  churches  of  England 

'  Of  the  seventy-five  millions  who  speak  the  English  and  Germany  indeed  nominally  include  more  ;  but  in 

tongue,  about  three  and  a  half  millions  are  members  counting  their  numbers  all  who  do  not  formally  belong 

of  the    Methodist  cbirches;    four  millions    more   are  to  other  communions  are  put  down  as  Episcopalians  of 

pupils  in  their  Sunday-schools,  and  the  regular  attend-  Lutherans.     Fully  two-thirds  of  the  Methodists  are  u 

•mts  upon  Methodist  worship  cannot  be  less  than  as  the  United  States.' 


THE  FOUNDATIONS  OF  METHODISM  LAID.  179 

headquarters  at  Herrnhut,  in  Germany,  to  study  their  doctrines.  Those 
simple-minded  Christians  won  his  heart.  He  joined  their  society  in  London, 
and  compiled  for  them  a  little  hymn-book—'  the  first  of  forty  hymn-books 
prepared  during  the  next  half  century  by  one  or  both  of  the  brothers' 
Wesley. 

At  this  time  George  Whitefield,  like  some  startling  meteor,  shot  athwart 
the  religious  sky  of  England,  and  arrested  universal  attention.  His  lips  were 
touched  with  a  live  coal  from  the  celestial  altar.  His  words  of  flame  breathed 
over  the  valley  of  dry  bones,  and  the  dead  came  forth  from  the  charnel- 
house.  He  was  doing  in  the  British  Islands  the  same  work  which  Jonathan 
Edwards  was  doing  in  the  Thirteen  Colonies. 

Wesley  caught  the  inspiration  and  glowed  with  congenital  fire.  He  fol- 
lowed in  his  steps.  On  the  1 7th  of  February,  1 739 — the  day  from  which 
Methodism  ought  to  date  its  birth— he  heard  Whitefield,  a  clergyman  of  the 
Church  of  England,  as  he  was  himself,  preach  in  the  open  air  to  two  hundred 
colliers,  at  Kingswood.  This  was  in  open  defiance  of  the  order  of  the  Chan- 
cellor of  the  Diocese  of  Bristol.  Ten  thousand  hearers  listened  to  Whitefield' s 
fifth  sermon.  On  the  3d  of  April  Wesley  preached  his  first  open-air  sermon 
at  Bristol,1  and  continued  his  mighty  work  in  London,  at  Moorfields,  Ken- 
sington Common,  and  Blackheath,  where  '  all  England '  flocked  to  hear  him 
and  the  wondrous  evangelist  Whitefield,  as  men  flocked  to  the  Jordan  to 
hear  John  the  Baptizer  from  the  Desert. 

But  Whitefield  was  departing  on  his  second  voyage  to  America,  and  upon 
Wesley's  shoulders  fell  the  responsible  and  gigantic  labor  of  gathering  into 
the  garner  the  harvest  which  had  fallen  before  the  scythe  of  this  mighty  reaper. 
Whitefield' s  mission  was  to  rouse  men.  Wesley's  to  lead  and  save  them.  The 
hour  had  come  to  gather  the  excited  but  wayward  multitude  into  the  fold. 
Order  was  the  first  law  of  Wesley's  mind.  He  was  the  prince  of  organizers. 
Five  years  of  enormous  labors  had  made  England  ready  for  a  new  ecclesias- 
tical system,  and  having  matured  his  plan,  in  the  month  of  June,  1740,  he 
called  together  in  the  first  meeting-house  '  set  up '  in  London,  '  the  first  Con- 
ference which  gave  formal  shape  to  the  new  Institution.'  It  was  composed  of 
the  two  Wesleys,  four  other  clergymen  of  the  Church  of  England,  and  four 
lay  preachers. 

The  humble  building  where  they  met  to  perform  this  significant  act  had 
been  a  ruinous  old  cannon  foundry.  Wesley  had  bought  and  repaired  it 
partly  with  his  own  money,  drawn  from  his  only  income — his  Oxford  fellow- 
ship— running  in  debt  for  the  rest.  It  was  a  plain  structure  with  two  doors  j 
one  leading  to  the  chapel,  which  would  hold  fifteen  hundred  persons  ;  the 

1  '  I  could,'  he  wrote,   'scarce  reconcile  myself  at  firm  the  virtuous.    Man  forbids  me  to  do  this  in  anotb- 

first  to   this  strange  way  of   preaching  in  the  fields  ;  e^s  parish  ;   that  is,  in  effect,  not  to  do  it  at  all,  seeing 

having  been  all    my  life  till  very  lately  so  tenacious  of  I  have  now  no  parish  of  my  own,  nor  probably  ever 

every  point  relating  to  decency  and  order,  that  I  should  shall.      Whom,  then,    shall    I    hear — God,  or   man?' 

have  thought  the  saving  of  souls  almost  a  sin  if  it  had  Then  follows   the  famous  sentence,  '  I    look  upon  all 

not  been  done  in  a  church.'  •  the  world  as  my  parish  ;   thus  far,  I  mean,  that  in  what- 

He  soon  found  means  to  justify  himself  to  himself,  ever  part  of  it  I  am,  I  judge  it  right,  meet,  and  my 

lie  was  an  ordained  priest,  and  as  such,  he  writes,  bounden   duty  to   declare  unto  all   that  are  willing  tC 

'God,  in  Scripture,  commands  me,  according  to  my  hear  the  glad  tidings  of  salvation.' — Galaxy  Article. 
power,  K)  instruct  the  ignorant,  reform  the  wicked,  con- 


i8o 


TRIUMPHS  OF    WESLEY'S  LAST  DAYS. 


other  leading  to  the  preachers'  house,  school-room  and  band-room,  over  which 
were  plain  apartments  for  Wesley.  In  the  chapel  the  males  and  females  sat 
apart :  and  in  that  '  upper  chamber '  the  foundations  of  Methodism  were  laid.1 


It  was  Wesley's  chief  business,  to  '  preach  the  Gospel  to  the  poor ;'  to  carry 
the  bread  of  life  to  the  hungry ;  and  to  organize  a  work  that  would  go  on  long 
after  his  death.  He  had  copied  closely  the  simple  plan  of  Jesus,  by  founding 
a  voluntary  Society,  choosing  his  apostles  from  the  poor  and  depressed  classes 
of  mankind.  His  evangelists  must  have  known  the  wants  and  woes  of  their 
hearers,  or  their  hearts  could  never  be  won.  But  once  in  the  fold,  they  must 
be  kept  there — there  must  be  no  straying  from  the  enclosure. 


1  It  was  resolved  at  this  conference  to  defend  the 
doctrine  of  the  Church  of  England  by  preaching  and  ex- 
ample ;  to  obey  the  bishops  in  all  things  indifferent ; 
to  observe  the  canons  as  far  as  they  could  with  a  safe 
conscience  ;  and  to  exert  themselves  to  the  utmost  not 
to  entail  a  schism  in  the  Church  by  forming  themselves 
into  a  distinct  sect.  They  held  themselves,  and  Wes- 
ley to  the  day  of  his  death  held  himself,  members  of 
the  national  Church.  Lay  assistants  were  allowable 
only  in  cases  of  necessity.  Their  duties  were  to  ex- 
pound morning  and  evening  ;  to  keap  a  general  watch 
over  the  bands  and  societies  ;  and  above  all  to  submit 
themselves  wholly  to  Wesley's  orders.  They  must  not 
marry,  receive  money,  nor  contract  debts  without  his 
knowledge  ;  must  go  where  he  sent  them,  and  employ 
their  time  as  he  directed.  This  supremacy  df  Wesley 
was  the  corner-stone  upon  which  Methodism  rested. 
No  pope,  no  superior  of  the  order  of  Jesuits,  ever 
claimed  or  exercised  more  absolute  control  than  did  the 
founder  of  Methodism.  In  the  last  year  of  his  life  he 
wrote  :  '  In  the  great  revival  at  London  my  first  diffi- 
culty was  to  bring  into  temper  those  who  opposed  the 
work  ;  and  my  next  to  check  and  regulate  the  extrava- 
gance of  those  that  promoted  it.  And  this  was  far  the 
hardest  part  of  my  work  ;  for  many  of  them  would  bear 
no  check  at  all.  But  I  followed  one  rule,  *  You  must 
either  bend  or  break.' 

The  early  records  of  Methodism  are  full  of  mention 
of  members  of  the  society  who,  from  one  cause  or  an- 
other, refused  to  obey  Wesley's  directions,  and  went 
away  or  were  expelled  from  the  bands.  But  from  first 
to  last  Wesley  never  hesitated  or  faltered.  He  was 
quiet  and  gentle,  but  immovable.  He  grew  up  to  the 
greatness  of  his  work.  The  heavier  was  the  load,  the 
more  it  steadied  him  ;  and  when  the  care  of  all  the 
Methodist  churches  in  England,  Scotland,  Wales,  Ire- 
land, and  America  rested  on  his  shoulders,  he  did  not 
seem  to  feel  the  weight  of  the  burden. 

The  history  of  the  early  years  of  Methodism  reads 
like  a  new  volume  of  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles.  Its 
preachers  were  insulted  and  mobbed,  fined  and  im- 
prisoned. They  were  lampooned  in  pamphlets,  and 
vilified  from  pulpits.  The  societies  grew  slowly.  In 
1770,  thirty  years  after  their  first  organization,  there 
were  29,911  Methodists  in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland, 
and  perhaps  a  score  in  America.  In  1780  there  were 
in  the  United  Kingdom  43,830  ;  in  America,  8,504.  In 
1790,  the  year  before  Wesley's  death,  there  were  in 
Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  71,568  ;  in  America, 
57,631.  In  1870  the  members  of  the  Methodist  socie- 
ties in  Great  Britain  were  about  950,000 ;  in  America 
about  2,300,000.  Had  Wesley  been  succeeded  in  Eng- 
land by  such  a  man  as  F'rancis  Asbury,  one  can  scarce- 
ly doubt  that  the  growth  of  Methodism  in  England 
would  have  kept  pace  with  its  growth  in  America. 
That  day  in  1771  when  Francis  Asbury,  the  son  of  a 

f>easant,  was  sent  with  Richard  Wright  '  as  a  rein- 
orcement  to  America,'  should  be  marked  with  a  white 
stone  in  the  Methodist  calendar.  No  adequate  life  of 
Asbury  has  ever  been  written  ;  perhaps  none  ever  can 
be,  for  he  solemnly  enjoined  that  none  should  be  pub- 
lished. It  is  doubtful  indeed  whet}  er  any  faithful  por- 
trait of  hun  is  extant      His  best   monument  is  the 


Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  America ;    and  there 
can  be  no  nobler  one. 

On  Thursday,  February  24,  1791,  he  rose  at  four 
o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  rode  eighteen  miles  to 
visit  a  magistrate,  in  whose  dining-room  he  preached 
This  was  his  last  sermon.  The  same  day  he  wrote 
his  last  letter.  It  was  addressed  to  Wilberforce,  and 
contains  this  remarkable  passage  :  '  Unless  the  Divine 
Providence  has  raised  you  up  to  be  as  Athanasius, 
contra  mundum,  I  see  not  how  you  can  go  through 
your  glorious  enterprise  in  opposing  that  cxecrabii 
villainy  which  is  the  scandal  of  religion,  cf  England, 
and  of  human  nature.  Unless  God  ha3  raised  yoi 
up  for  this  very  thing,  you  will  be  worn  out  by  the 
opposition  of  men  and  devils  ;  but  if  God  be  with  you, 
who  can  be  against  you?  Are  all  of  them  together 
stronger  than  God  ?  Oh  !  be  not  weary  of  well-doing. 
Go  on,  in  the  name  of  God,  and  in  the  power  of  hir 
might,  till  even  American  slavery,  the  vilest  that  evet 
saw  the  sun,  shall  vanish  before  it.' 

He  returned  to  London  on  the  25th,  and  on  reach- 
ing home  seemed  quite  unwell.  The  26th  was  passed 
mostly  in  half-slumber.  On  the  27th  he  seemed  some- 
what better.  On  the  28th  his  weakness  increased, 
and  his  physician  wished  for  further  assistance. 
"No,"  said  Wesley;  "I  am  quite  satisfied,  and  will 
have  no  one  else."  Most  of  the  day  was  spent  in 
sleep.  He  awoke  after  a  restless  night,  but  sang  the 
hymn,  'All  glory  be  to  God  on  high,'  and  after  a  while 
said,  '  I'll  get  up.'  While  his  friends  were  arranging 
his  clothes,  he  broke  out  into  the  hymn,  •  I'll  praise 
my  Maker  while  I've  breath.'  Soon,  utterly  exhaust- 
ed, but  full  of  happiness,  he  was  again  laid  upon  his 
bed.  After  a  while  he  asked  about  the  key  and 
contents  of  his  bureau,  remarking,  '  I  would  have  all 
things  ready  for  my  executors.  Let  me  be  buried  in 
nothing  but  what  is  woollen,  and  let  my  corpse  be  car- 
ried in  my  coffin  into  the  chapel.'  During  the  night 
he  grew  momentarily  weaker  ;  his  sight  failed,  and  he 
could  not  recognize  the  features  of  those  who  stood 
around.  '  Who  are  these  ? '  he  asked.  '  Sir,' replied 
one  of  them,  '  we  are  come  to  rejoice  with  you  ;  you  are 
going  to  receive  your  crown.'  He  replied,  'It  is  the 
Lord's  doing,  and  it  is  marvellous  in  our  eyes.'  During 
the  night,  he  repeated  scores  of  times  the  words,  '  I'll 
praise,  I'll  praise,'  but  could  go  no  further.  When  the 
gray  morning  dawned  eleven  persons  stood  around  his 
bed.  As  the  supreme  moment  approached, Wesley  said, 
clearly  and  audibly,  '  Farewell ! '  his  last  word  on  earth. 
Joseph  Bradford,  for  fifteen  years  his  constant  travel- 
ling companion,  became  mouth-piece  for  all,  bursting 
into  the  words  of  the  Psalmist,  '  Lift  up  your  heads 
O  ye  gates,  and  be  ye  lift  up,  ye  everlasting  doors, 
and  this  heir  of  glory  shall  come  in.'  Before  the  last 
words  had  passed  his  lips,  Wesley  gathered  up  his  feet, 
and  without  a  sigh  or  a  groan  passed  from  the  here  to 
the  hereafter.  All  then  raised  the  hymn,  'Waiting  to 
receive  thy  spirit,'  and  then  they  knelt  down  and 
prayed  that  the  mantle  of  the  ascended  Elijah  might 
rest  upon  his  followers. 

John  Wesley  died  at  about  ten  o'clock  on  tha 
morning  of  March  2,  1791,  wanting  about  four  montht 
of  having  completed  his  eighty-eighth  year. — Galaxy 
Feb.  6,  '74. 


JAMES  OTIS   OF  MASSACHUSETTS.  i8j 

Never  was  a  completer  ecclesiastical  or  social  polity  founded  outside  of 
the  Church  of  Rome.  Nor  did  he  invoke  the  aid  of  terror  to  insure  subordi- 
nation. By  his  matchless  power  of  combination,  he  constructed  a  system 
which  has  enthralled  the  deepest  religious  elements  of  the  human  soul ;  and 
one  which  holds  a  subtler,  and  I  believe  a  firmer,  because  a  gentler  and 
more  enlightened  sway,  over  its  disciples,  than  can  be  boasted  of  by  the  mighty 
and  terrible  hierarchy  of  Rome. 

James  Otis.  Born  in  Barnstable,  Mass.,  Feb.  5,  1724.  Died  in  Andover, 
May  23,  1783. — 'The  Champion  of  the  Colonies,  and  the  Prophet  of  then- 
greatness  : ' — These  are  the  titles  with  which  a  grateful  posterity  crowned  the 
flaming  orator,  the  learned  jurist,  the  fearless  rebel  patriot.  He  was  the  earli- 
est leader  of  the  Revolutionary  party  in  Massachusetts,  and  his  legal  argument 
in  the  case  where  '  Writs  of  Assistance ' 1  were  asked  for  to  enforce  Custom- 
House  restrictions  on  Trade,  produced  a  profound  impression,  not  only 
throughout  the  Colonies,  but  in  Westminster  Hall. 

Pitt  had  put  forth  his  mightiest  energies  to  save  the  Thirteen  Colonies  for 
the  throne  of  England;  but  they  were  reserved  for  a  nobler  destiny.2  His 
last  argument  against  any  and  all  unconstitutional  schemes  for  taxing  the  Col- 
onies while  they  had  no  representation  in  Parliament,  proved  unavailing. 

The  part  which,  from  the  opening  of  our  history,  Boston  has  acted  has 
always  been  worthy  of  her  noble  founders.  But  the  conduct  of  her 
citizens  during  the  attempts  of  England  from  the  year  1761  to  subjugate  Amer- 
ican commerce  was  of  more  service  to  the  country  and  the  world  than  has 
been  generally  thought.  Although  it  was  but  a  provincial  seaport  of  shipbuild- 
ers and  merchants,  and  numbered  scarcely  fifteen  thousand  souls,  yet  her  hum- 
ble court-room  became  the  first  battle-ground  for  American  Independence, 
for  there  James  Otis,  first  of  all  other  men,  boldly  asserted  before  a  supreme 
judicial  tribunal  the  revolutionary  doctrine  of  the  right  of  the  colonists  to  ab- 
solute freedom  of  commerce  under  self-imposed  laws.     He  claimed  this  right 

1  One  of  the  first  acts  which  revealed  the  intentions  said  : — 'The  seeds  of  patriots  and  heroes  were  there 

of  Parliament  to  tax  the  Colonies  by  enforcing  the  rev-  and  then  sown  ; '  and  when  the  orator  exclaimed,  '  To 

enue  laws,  was  the  authorization,  in  1761,  of  Writs  of  my  dying  day,  I  will  oppose,  with  all  the  faculties  God 

Assistance.     These    were    general    search    warrants,  has  given  me,  all  such  instruments  of  slavery  on  one 

which  not  only  allowed   the  king's  officers  who  held  hand,  and  villainy  on  the  other,'  the  independence  of 

them  to  break  open  any  citizen's  store  or  dwelling,  to  the  Colonies  was  proclaimed.     From  that  day  began  tha 

search  for  and  seize  foreign  merchandise  on  which  duty  triumphs  of  the  popular  will.     Very  few  writs  were  is- 

had  not  been  paid,  but  compelled  sheriffs  and  others  to  sued,  and   these  were  ineffectual. — Lossing's  Hist,  of 

assist  in  the  work.     The  people  could  not  brook  such  a  the  U.  S.,  pp.  212-15. 
system  of  petty  oppression.     The  sanctities  of  private 

life  might  be  invaded  at  any  time  by  hirelings,  and  the  a  The  Seven  Years'  War,  which  doubled  the  debt  of 
assertion,  based  upon  the  guarantees  of  the  British  England,  increasing  it  to  seven  hundred  millions  of 
Constitution,  that  'Every  Englishman's  house  is  his  dollars,  had  been  begun  by  her  for  the  possession  of  the 
castle,'  would  not  be  true.  These  writs  were  first  issued  Ohio  Valley.  She  achieved  that  conquest,  but  not  for 
in  Massachusetts,  and  immediately  great  excitement  herself.  Driven  out  from  its  share  in  the  great  colonial 
prevailed.  Their  legality  was  questioned,  and  the  system.  France  was  swayed  by  its  own  commercial  and 
matter  was  brought  before  a  court  held  in  the  old  town-  political  interests,  by  its  wounded  pride,  and  by  that  en- 
hall  of  Boston.  The  advocate  for  the  Crown — Mr.  thusiasm  which  the  support  of  a  good  cause  enkindles, 
Grid  ley — argued,  that  as  Parliament  was  the  supreme  to  take  up  the  defence  of  the  freedom  of  the  seas, 
legislature  for  the  whole  British  nation,  and  had  au-  and  heartily  to  desire  the  enfranchisement  of  the  English 
thorized  these  writs,  no  subject  had  a  right  to  complain,  plantations.  This  policy  was  well  devised  ;  and  w« 
He  was  answered  by  James  Otis,  the  younger,  then  ad-  shall  see  that  England  became  not  so  much  the  posses- 
rocate-general  of  the  province.  On  that  occasion  the  sor  of  the  Valley  of  the  West,  as  the  transient  trustee, 
fotense  fire  of  his  patriotism  beamed  forth  with  inex-  commissioned  to  transfer  it  from  the  France  of  the  Mid* 
pressible  brilliancy,  and  his  eloquence  was  like  light-  die  Ages,  to  the  free  people  who  were  making  for  hu- 
ning,  far-felt  and  consuming.  On  that  day  the  trumpet  manity  a  new  existence  in  America. — Bancroft,  vol.  iv 
of  the  Revolution  was  sounded.   John  Adams  afterward  p.  462. 


i82  BEGINNING   OF   OTIS'S  CAREER. 

by  virtue  of  royal  charters,  the  prerogatives  of  free-born  Englishmen,  and 
under  Common  Law,  which  extended  its  shield  over  all  British  subjects.  Had 
his  words  only  reached  the  ears  of  one  rapt  listener,  they  would  have  done 
their  work.  For  'the  youngest  barrister  of  the  Colony,  the  choleric  John 
Adams,  a  stubborn  and  honest  lover  of  his  country,  extensively  learned,  and 
a  bold  thinker,  listened  in  rapt  admiration,  and  caught  the  inspiration  which 
was  to  call  forth  his  own  heroic  opposition  to  British  authority.  From  that 
time  he  declared — in  a  letter  to  William  Tudor, — that  he  could  never  read 
the  Acts  of  Trade  without  anger,  nor  any  section  of  them  without  a  curse.' 

In  describing  the  effect  of  this  great  speech,  Bancroft  continues  :  '  The  peo- 
ple of  the  town  of  Boston  became  alive  with  political  excitement.  It  seemed 
as  if  the  words  spoken  on  that  day,  were  a  spell  powerful  enough  to  break  the 
paper  chains  that  left  to  America  no  free  highway  on  the  seas  but  that  to 
England,  and  to  open  for  the  New  World  all  the  infinite  paths  of  the  ocean. 
Nay,  more  !  as  reason  and  the  constitution  are  avowed  to  be  paramount  to 
the  power  of  the  British  Parliament,  America  becomes  conscious  of  a  life  of 
her  own.  She  sees  in  dim  outlines  along  the  future  the  vision  of  her  own  in- 
dependence, with  freedom  of  commerce  and  self-imposed  laws.' 

The  subservient  Court  adjourned  the  trial  over  to  the  next  term,  waiting  for 
instructions  from  England.  The  answer  came  :  the  Writs  of  Assistance  were 
granted.  ■  But,'  says  the  historian,  'Otis  was  borne  onward  by  a  spirit  which 
mastered  him,  and  increased  in  vigor  as  the  storm  rose.  Gifted  with  a  deli- 
cately sensitive  and  most  sympathetic  nature,  his  soul  was  agitated  in  the  popu- 
lar tempest,  as  certainly  as  the  gold  leaf  in  the  electrometer  flutters  at  the 
passing  by  of  the  thunder-clouds.  He  led  the  van  of  the  American  patriots. 
Yet  impassioned  rather  than  cautious,  disinterested  and  incapable  of  cold 
calculation,  now  foaming  with  rage,  now  plaintive  without  hope,  he  was  often 
like  one  who,  as  he  rushes  into  battle,  forgets  his  shield.  Excitable,  and  indulg- 
ing in  vehement  criminations,  he  yet  had  not  a  drop  of  rancor  in  his  breast, 
and,  when  the  fit  of  rancor  had  passed  away,  was  mild  and  easy  to  be  entreat- 
ed. His  impulses  were  always  for  liberty,  and  full  of  confidence ;  yet  his 
understanding  in  moments  of  depression  would  often  shrink  back  from  his 
own  inspirations.  He  never  met  an  excited  audience,  but  his  mind  caught 
and  increased  the  contagion,  and  rushed  onward  with  fervid  and  impetuous 
eloquence  ;  but  when  quieted  by  retirement,  and  away  from  the  crowd,  he 
could  be  soothed  into  a  yielding  inconsistency.  Thus  he  toiled  and  suffered, 
an  uncertain  leader  of  a  party,  yet  thrilling  and  informing  the  multitude ;  not 
steadfast  in  conduct,  yet  by  flashes  of  sagacity  lighting  the  people  along  their 
perilous  way ;  the  man  of  the  American  protest,  not  destined  to  enjoy  his 
country's  triumph.  He  that  will  study  closely  the  remarkable  union  in  Otis 
of  legal  learning  with  speculative  opinion,  of  principles  of  natural  justice  the 
most  abstract  and  the  most  radical,  with  a  deeply-fixed  respect  for  the  right! 
of  property  and  obedience  to  the  law,  will  become  familiar  with  a  cast  of 
mind  still  common  in  New  England.'  ■ 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  iv.  pp.  418-30. 


RIGHTS  OF  THE  COLONIES  ASSERTED  AND  PROVED.     183 

And  thus  Otis  held  on  his  flaming  way  ;  at  every  gathering  the  orator  of  the 
people  ;  at  every  court  the  advocate  of  natural  justice  ;  in  conversation  and 
correspondence  with  the  guiding  men  of  the  Colonies  kindling  deeper  en- 
thusiasm in  kindred  souls ;  while  in  the  legislature — that  inviolable  forum  of 
free  debate,  where  the  people  were  educated  into  the  fullest  comprehension  of 
political  rights,  as  the  masses  of  no  other  nation  had  ever  been — Otis  led  and 
inspired  Massachusetts  ;  and  to  a  great  extent  her  sister  Colonies. 

Nor  was  his  influence  circumscribed  within  even  this  broad  sphere  :  for  it 
must  never  be  forgotten  that  the  real  tribunal  before  which  our  cause  was  ul- 
timately to  be  adjudicated,  lay  beyond  the  Atlantic.  All  our  arguments  were 
addressed  to  the  people  of  England  and  the  Statesmen  of  Europe.  Their 
sympathies  were  to  be  excited — their  judgment  was  to  be  won.  For  this  all 
the  commissioners  of  the  Colonies  labored.  There  was  the  chief  scene  of 
Franklin's  earnest  and  protracted  efforts.  With  this  object  in  view,  in  1 764  Otis 
published  his  appeal  to  the  American  People.  It  was  entitled  '  Rights  of 
the  British  Colonies.  Asserted  and  Proved.'  It  was  a  pamphlet  of  only  120 
pages,  but  its  effect  was  prodigious.  Its  argument  is  given  with  admirable  con- 
cision in  the  summary  near  its  close. 

1  The  sum  of  my  argument  is,  that  civil  government  is  of  God ;  that  the  ad- 
ministrators of  it  were  originally  the  whole  people  :  that  they  might  have 
devolved  it  on  whom  they  pleased  :  that  this  devolution  is  fiduciary,  for  the 
good  of  the  whole  :  that  by  the  British  constitution,  this  devolution  is  on  the 
king,  lords,  and  commons,  the  supreme,  sacred,  and  uncontrollable  legisla- 
tive power,  not  only  in  the  realm,  but  through  the  dominions  :  that  by  the  ab- 
dication, the  original  compact  was  broken  to  pieces  ;  that  by  the  revolution,  it 
was  renewed,  and  more  firmly  established,  and  the  rights  and  liberties  of  the 
subject  in  all  parts  of  the  dominions  more  fully  explained  and  confirmed  :  that 
in  consequence  of  this  establishment  and  the  acts  of  succession  and  union,  his 
Majesty  George  III.  is  rightful  king  and  sovereign,  and  with  his  parliament, 
the  supreme  legislative  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Ireland,  and  the  domin- 
ions thereunto  belonging  :  that  this  constitution  is  the  most  free  one,  and  by 
far  the  best  now  existing  on  earth  :  that  by  this  constitution,  every  man  in  the 
dominions  is  a  free  man  :  that  no  part  of  his  Majesty's  dominions  can  be 
taxed  without  their  consent :  that  every  part  has  a  right  to  be  represented  in 
the  supreme,  or  some  subordinate  legislature ;  that  the  refusal  of  this  would 
seem  to  be  a  contradiction  in  practice  to  the  theory  of  the  constitution  :  that 
"he  colonies  are  subordinate  dominions,  and  are  now  in  such  a  state  as  to 
make  it  best  for  the  good  of  the  whole,  that  they  should  not  only  be  continued 
•n  the  enjoyment  of  subordinate  legislation,  but  be  also  represented  in  some 
proportion  to  their  number  and  estates,  in  the  grand  legislation  of  the  nation  : 
that  this  would  firmly  unite  all  parts  of  the  British  empire  in  the  greatest 
peace  and  prosperity ;  and  render  it  invulnerable  and  perpetual.' 

This  pamphlet  was  at  once  printed  in  London,  and  produced  a  profound 
sensation.     It  was  fearfully  radical,  and  sounded  on  the  ears  of  Englishmen 


184         OTIS  THE  FATHER  OF  THE  STAMP  ACT  CONGRESS. 

very  strangely.  By  some  it  was  denounced  as  the  ravings  of  a  madman — by 
all  as  the  language  of  deliberate  treason.  But  it  was  the  work  of  a  lawyer ; 
and  although  it  was  characterized  by  none  of  the  calmness  of  a  philosophical 
essay,  it  enunciated  with  stirring  force  and  irresistible  logic  the  principles  of 
liberty,  which  were  conceded  to  lie  at  the  bottom  of  the  British  Constitution. 
Lord  Mansfield  understood  Mr.  Otis  and  his  argument.  In  reply  to  Lord 
Littleton's  sneer  at  the  ravings  of  the  rebel,  he  said:  '  I  differ  from  the  noble 
lord  who  spoke  of  Mr.  Otis  and  his  book  with  contempt,  though  he  main- 
tained the  same  doctrine  in  some  points ;  although  in  others  he  carried  it 
farther  than  Otis  himself,  who  allows  everywhere  the  supremacy  of  the  crown 
over  the  colonies.  No  man  on  such  a  subject  is  contemptible.  Otis  is  a  man 
of  consequence  among  the  people  there.  They  have  chosen  him  for  one  of 
their  deputies  at  the  Congress  and  general  meeting  from  the  respective  gov- 
ernments. It  was  said  the  man  is  mad.  What  then?  One  madman  often 
makes  many.  Massaniello  was  mad,  nobody  doubts  it ;  yet  for  all  that,  he 
overturned  the  government  of  Naples.  Madness  is  catching  in  all  popular 
assemblies,  and  upon  all  popular  matters.'  1 

The  7th  of  October,  1765 — the  date  of  the  meeting  of  the  Stamp  Act 
Congress  in  New  York — was  to  become  one  of  the  most  memorable  days  in 
the  American  calendar.  Its  doings  were  to  color  all  our  subsequent  history. 
The  Stamp  Act  was  to  go  into  effect  in  twenty-one  days.  But  into  this  span 
of  time  were  to  be  crowded  events  which  even  at  this  late  period  astound 
and  bewilder  the  historian. 

James  Otis  was  the  father  of  the  Congress  2 — Massachusetts  adopted  the 
suggestion  of  her  great  statesman.  The  most  sagacious  act  in  his  life,  the  mos\- 
important  in  the  history  of  his  native  State,  was  the  proposal  to  call  an  American 
Congress,  without  the  consent  of  the  king,  to  meet  as  a  deliberative  assembly. 
'  It  should  consist  of  committees  from  each  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies,  to  be 
appointed  respectively  by  the  delegates  of  the  people,  without  regard  to  the 
other  branches  of  the  Legislature.'  No  such  body  of  men  had  ever  assembled 
in  America.  The  proposal  was  startling.  That  the  good  people  of  the  Colo- 
nies should  come  together  to  consult  about  their  political  rights,  to  sit  in  judg- 
ment on  the  acts  of  the  Imperial  Parliament,  and  perhaps  defy  its  authority, 
was  not  only  a  new  idea — it  meant  treason.  The  officials  of  the  crown 
throughout  the  Colonies  saw  danger  in  such  an  alliance  ;  Grenville's  ministry 
received  the  announcement  only  with  derision.  But  Massachusetts  sent  let- 
ters to  every  colonial  Assembly  inviting  their  committees  to  meet  at  New 
York  on  the  first  Tuesday  of  the  following  October,  '  to  consult  together '  and 

1  '1   have  no  hesitation  or  scruple,'   wrote  John  prophetic  expression  of  Chatham's  oratory  that  he  ever 

Adams,  '  to  say  that  the  commencement  of  the  reipn  uttered  was  :    '  I    rejoice  that   America    has    resisted 

of  George  the  Third  was  the  commencement  of  another  Two  millions  of  people  reduced  to  servitude  would  he 

Stuart's  reign.     And  if  it  had  not  been  checked  by  fit  instruments  to  make   slaves  of  the  rest.' — Tudor's 

James  Otis  and  others  first,  and  by  the  great  Chatham  Otis,  pp.  172,  204. 
and  others  afterwards,  it  would  have  been  as  arbitrary 

as  any  of  the  four.     1  will  not  say  it  would  have  extin-  2  Mrs.  Warren,  of  Plymouth,  the  sister  of  Otis,  saij 

guished  civil  and  religious  liberty  upon  earth,  but  it  that  the  proposal  for  such  a  Congress  was  planned  in 

would  have  gone  great  lengths  towards  it,  and  would  her  own  house.    For  this  important  statement  we  have 

have  cost  mankind  even  more  than  the  French  Revolu-  the  authority  of  Ezra  Stiles  in  his  Diary. 
tion  to  j  reserve  it.     The  most  sublime,  profound,  and 


FIRST  BLAST  OF    THE  REVOLUTION. 


18S 


*  consider  a  united  representation  to  implore  relief  against  the  oppressive 
measures  of  the  Imperial  Parliament.1 

The  first  blast  of  the  Revolution  had  been  sounded.  Before  we  listen  to 
the  response  which  came  back,  we  will  close  our  tribute  to  Massachusetts' 
favorite  son.  In  writing  to  Mr.  Arthur  Jones,  November  26th,  1768,  Otis 
used  these  prophetic  words  : — '  All  business  is  at  a  stand  here,  little  going  on 
besides  military  musters  and  reviews  and  other  parading  of  the  red-coats,  sent 
here,  the  Lord,  I  believe,  only  knows  for  what.  I  am  and  have  been  long 
concerned  more  for  Great  Britain  than  for  the  Colonies.  You  may  ruin 
yourselves,  but  you  cannot  in  the  end  ruin  the  Colonies.  Our  fathers  were 
a  good  people — we  have  been  a  free  people  ;  and  if  you  will  not  let  us 
remain  so  any  longer,  we  shall  be  a  great  people — and  the  present  measures 
can  have  no  tendency  but  to  hasten  with  great  rapidity  events  which  every 
good  and  honest  man  would  wish  delayed  for  ages — if  possible,  prevented 
forever.' 

Among  the  many  scenes  which  inspired  the  patriotic  eloquence  of  Otis 
in  those  stirring  times,  no  one  was  more  likely  to  set  his  soul  on  fire  than  the 
spectacle  he  looked  on  as  he  walked  up  to  the  Hall  where  the  new  Legisla- 
ture was  assembling  on  one  of  the  last  mornings  in  May,  1 769.  '  He  found  the 
building,'  says  Tudor,8  '  surrounded  with  cannon  and  military  guards.  Otis  rose 
immediately  after  they  were  organized,  and  in  a  brief  address  of  deep  energy 


1  These  measures  were  far  more  oppressive  than  is 
now  generally  supposed.  Bancroft  thus  sums  them 
up  : 

The  colonists  could  not  export  the  chief  products  of 
their  industry  ;  neither  sugar,  nor  tobacco,  nor  cotton, 
nor  indigo,  nor  ginger,  nor  fustic,  nor  other  dyeing 
woods  ;  nor  molasses,  nor  rice,  with  some  exceptions  ; 
nor  beaver,  nor  peltry,  nor  copper  ore.  nor  pitch,  nor 
tar,  nor  turpentine,  nor  masts,  nor  yards,  nor  bow- 
sprits, nor  coffee,  nor  pimento,  nor  cocoa-nuts,  nor 
whale  fins,  nor  raw  silk,  nor  hides,  nor  skins,  nor  pot 
and  pearl  ashes,  to  any  place  but  Great  Britain,  not 
even  to  Ireland.  Nor  might  any  foreign  ship  enter  a 
colonial  harbor. 

Salt  might  be  imported  from  any  place,  into  New 
England,  New  York,  Pennsylvania,  Quebec  ;  wines 
might  be  imported  from  the  Madeiras  and  the  Azores, 
but  were  to  pay  duty  in  American  ports  for  the  British 
exchequers  ;  and  victuals,  horses,  and  servants  might 
be  brought  from  Ireland.  In  all  other  respects.  Great 
Britain  was  not  only  the  sole  market  for  the  products 
of  America,  but  the  only  storehouse  for  its  supplies. 

Lest  the  colonists  should  multiply  their  flocks  of 
sheep,  and  weave  their  own  cloth,  they  might  not  use  a 
ship,  nor  a  boat,  nor  a  carriage,  nor  even  a  pack-horse, 
to  carry  wool,  or  any  manufacture  of  which  wool  forms 
a  part,  across  the  line  of  one  province  to  another. 
They  could  not  land  wool  from  the  nearest  islinds, 
nor  ferry  it  across  a  river,  nor  even  ship  it  to  England. 
A  British  sailor,  finding  himself  in  want  of  clothes  in 
their  harbors,  might  not  buy  there  more  than  forty 
ihillings'  worth  of  woollens. 

Where  was  there  a  house  in  the  Colonies  that  did 
cherish,  and  did  not  possess,  the  English  Bible  ?  And 
yet  to  print  that  Bible  in  British  America  would  have 
been  a  piracy  ;  and  the  Bible,  though  printed  in  Ger- 
man, and  in  a  native  savage  dialect,  was  never  printed 
thus  in  English  till  the  land  became  free. 

That  the  country  which  was  the  home  of  the  beaver 
might  not  manufacture  its  own  hats,  no  man  in  the  plan- 
tations could  be  a  hatter,  or  a  journeyman  at  that  trade, 
unless  he  hj  d  served  an  apprenticeship  of  seven  years. 


No  hatter  might  employ  a  negro,  or  more  than  two 
apprentices.  No  American  hat  might  be  sent  from  one 
plantation  to  another,  or  be  loaded  upon  any  horse, 
cart,  or  carriage  for  conveyance. 

America  abounded  in  iron  ores  of  the  best  quality, 
as  well  as  in  woods  and  coal :  slitting  mills,  steel  furna- 
ces, and  plastering  forges  to  work  with  a  tilt  hammer, 
were  prohibited  in  the  Colonies  as  'nuisances.' 

While  free  labor  was  debarred  of  its  natural  rights, 
the  slave-trade  was  encouraged  with  unrelenting  eager- 
ness ;  and  in  the  year  that  had  just  expired,  from 
Liverpool  alone,  seventy-nine  ships  had  borne  from 
Africa  to  the  West  Indies  and  the  Continent,  more  than 
fifteen  thousand  three  hundred  negroes,  two-thirds  as 
many  as  the  first  colonists  of  Massachusetts. 

And  now  taxation,  direct  and  indirect,  was  added 
to  colonial  restrictions  ;  and  henceforward  both  were  to 
go  together.  A  duty  was  to  be  collected  on  foreign 
sugar,  molasses,  indigo,  coffee,  Madeira  wine,  import- 
ed directly  into  any  of  the  plantations  in  America;  also 
a  duty  on  Portugal  and  Spanish  wines,  on  Eastern  silks, 
on  Eastern  calicoes,  on  foreign  linen  cloth,  on  French 
lawn,  though  imported  directly  from  Great  Britain  ; 
on  British  colonial  coffee  shipped  from  one  plantation 
to  another.  Nor  was  henceforward  any  part  of  the  old 
subsidy  to  be  drawn  back  on  the  export  of  white  cali- 
coes and  muslins,  on  which  a  still  higher  duty  was  to 
be  exacted  and  retained.  And  stamp  duties  were  to 
be  paid  throughout  all  the  British  American  Colonies, 
on  and  after  the  first  day  of  the  coming  November. 

These  laws  were  to  be  enforced,  not  by  the  regular 
authorities  only,  but  by  naval  and  military  officers,  ir- 
responsible to  the  civil  powers  in  the  Colonies.  The 
penalties  and  forfeitures  for  breach  of  the  revenue  laws 
were  to  be  decided  in  courts  of  vice-admiralty,  without 
the  interposition  of  a  jury,  by  a  single  judge,  who  had 
no  support  whatever  but  for  his  share  in  the  profits  of 
his  own  condemnations. — Bancroft,  voL  v.  pp.  265^ 
268. 

8  Tudor's  Otis,  pp.  354,  356. 


1 86  REVOLUTIONARY  SPEECH  OF   OTIS. 

and  impassioned  eloquence,  declared  how  unworthy  it  was  of  a  free  Legislature 
to  attempt  any  deliberations  in  the  presence  of  a  military  force ;  and  moved 
the  appointment  of  a  committee,  to  make  immediately  the  protests  and  re- 
monstrances that  have  been  already  mentioned,  and  which  were  followed 
after  some  days'  delay  by  their  being  transferred  to  Cambridge.  When  they 
had  assembled  in  the  college  chapel,  Otis  again  addressed  them  before  pro- 
ceeding to  business.  Besides  the  members,  deeply  affected,  mortified  and  in- 
dignant at  the  insult  which  they  had  received  from  a  standing  army,  and  re- 
volving in  their  minds  the  growing  tyranny  and  the  gloomy  prospects  before 
them,  the  students  were  attracted  by  the  novelty,  as  well  as  by  a  sympathy, 
that  was  felt  with  all  the  ardor  of  youth  for  a  patriotic  Legislature,  placed  un- 
der a  kind  of  proscription  and  driven  from  their  own  Hall.  These  youths 
were  clustered  round  the  walls  in  listening  groups,  to  witness  the  opening  of 
the  deliberations.  He  spoke  of  the  indignity  that  had  been  offered  them,  on 
the  sad  situation  of  the  capital  oppressed  by  a  military  force,  on  their  rights 
and  duties  and  the  necessity  of  persevering  in  their  principles  to  obtain  redress 
for  all  these  wrongs  which  the  vile  calumnies  and  misrepresentations  of  trea- 
cherous individuals  had  brought  upon  them.  He  harangued  them  with  the  re- 
sistless energy  and  glowing  enthusiasm  that  he  could  command  at  will ;  and  in 
the  course  of  his  speech  took  the  liberty,  justified  by  his  successful  use  of  it, 
as  well  as  by  the  peculiarity  of  the  occasion,  to  apostrophize  the  ingenuous 
young  men  who  were  then  spectators  of  their  persecution.  He  told  them 
the  times  were  dark  and  trying — that  they  might  soon  be  called  upon  in  turn 
to  act  or  suffer ;  and  he  made  some  rapid,  vivid  allusions  to  the  classic  models  of 
ancient  patriotism  which  it  now  formed  their  duty  to  study,  as  it  would  be 
hereafter  to  imitate.  Their  country  might  one  day  look  to  them  for  support, 
and  they  would  recollect  that  the  first  and  noblest  of  all  duties  was  to  serve 
that  country,  and  if  necessary,  to  devote  their  lives  in  her  cause.  Dulce  et  de- 
corum est  pro  patrid  ?nori.  They  listened  with  breathless  eagerness,  every 
eye  filled  with  tears  ;  and  their  souls  raised  with  such  high  emotion  that  they 
might  have  been  led  at  once  to  wrest  from  their  enemies  the  cannon  which 
had  been  pointed  against  the  Legislature.' 

Eleven  years  before  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill,  Otis  had,  in  his  Rights  of 
the  British  Colonies,  spoken  of  the  future  with  the  clear  emphasis  of  the 
Seer  : — '  They  will  never  think  of  it ' — independence — '  till  driven  to  it  as  the 
last  fatal  resort  against  ministerial  oppression,  which  will  make  the  wisest  mad, 
and  the  weakest  strong.  The  world  is  at  the  eve  of  the  highest  scene  of 
earthly  power  and  grandeur  which  has  ever  yet  been  displayed  to  the  view  of 
mankind.  Who  will  win  the  prize,  is  with  God  :  but  human  nature  must  and 
will  be  rescued  from  the  general  slavery  that  has  so  long  triumphed  over  the 
species.' 

'  There  is,'  says  Tudor,  '  a  degree  of  consolation  blended  with  awe  in  the 
manner  of  his  death,  and  a  soothing  fitness  in  the  sublime  accident  which  oc- 
casioned it.      The  end  of  his  life  was  ennobled,  when  the  ruins  of  a  great 


PATRICK  HENRY  OF    VIRGINIA.  187 

mind,  instead  of  being  undermined  by  loathsome  and  obscure  disease,  were 
demolished  at  once  by  a  bright  bolt  from  heaven.1 

If  I  have  had  more  to  say  thus  far,  of  the  participation  of  the  New  England 
Colonies,  especially  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  it  was  because  their  intercourse 
with  the  parent  country  was  far  more  intimate ;  they  were  nearest  the  throne, 
and  on  their  heads  the  blows  first  fell ;  they  had  a  preponderance  of  popula- 
tion ;  there  was  greater  diversity  of  pursuit;  more  constant  and  intense  col 
lision  of  minds,  more  leisure  for  study  and  debate.  But  there  was  no  higher 
or  more  patriotic  spirit,  there  was  no  loftier  view  of  the  destiny  of  these 
Colonies,  there  was  no  superiority  in  statesmanship  or  heroism  claimed  by  one 
section  over  another.  In  fact,  at  that  period  of  our  history,  there  was  no 
sectionalism,  nor  would  there  have  ever  been,  had  it  not  been  fostered  by 
that  exotic  curse,  chattel  slavery.  Nor  was  that  spirit  of  sectionalism  ever 
felt  by  our  very  greatest  men.  Washington  never  felt  it,  nor,  in  fact,  did  any  of 
the  men  of  his  time.  Nor  when  it  developed  itself  later,  did  it  ever  enthrall 
the  spirit  of  Andrew  Jackson,  of  Henry  Clay,  or  of  Daniel  Webster. 

We  now  listen  for  the  responses  which  came  back  from  the  Southern 
Colonies  to  the  clarion  call  of  Massachusetts.  James  Otis  had  but  one  peer 
on  the  emblazoned  scroll  of  our  political  prophets — that  wonderful  Virginian 
whose  eulogy  the  wizard  pen  of  Byron  drew  in  two  imperishable  lines  : — 

*  Henry,  the  forest-born  Demosthenes, 
Whose  thunders  shook  the  tyrant  of  the  seas.' a 

Patrick  Henry.  Born  at  Studley,  in  Hanover  County,  Va.,  May  29,  1736. 
Died  June  6,  1799. — The  transition  from  James  Otis  to  Patrick  Henry,  is 
natural  and  easy.  The  slightest  knowledge  of  these  two  remarkable  men,  sug- 
gests the  striking  resemblance  between  them.  Had  not  the  Romans  given  us 
the  words  par  nobile  fratrum,  they  would  on  the  mention  of  these  names  have 
sprung  unbidden  to  the  lips  of  every  scholar.  They  furnish  rare  instances 
of  having  had  brilliant  biographers,  and  zealous  partisans  who  claimed  for 
their  models  '  every  virtue  under  heaven,'  while  withholding  from  neither  the 
devotion  each  bestowed  upon  his  own  hero.  The  contemporaries  of  Otis 
were  unanimous  in  according  to  him  gifts  almost  superhuman  ;  while  the  Vir- 
ginians were  hardly  accused  of  exaggeration  in  pronouncing  Henry,  as  Jeffer- 
son did,  '  the  greatest  orator  that  ever  lived — the  person  who  beyond  all  ques- 
tion gave  the  first  impulse  to  the  movement  which  terminated  in  the  Revolu- 

1  Six  weeks  exactly  after  his  return  to  Andover,  on  but  no  other  was  injured.     No  mark  of  any  kind  could 

Friday  afternoon,  the  23d  day  of  May,  1773,  a  heavy  be  found  on  Otis,  nor  was  there  the  slightest  change 

cloud  suddenly  arose,  and  the  greater  part  of  the  family  or  convulsion  in  his  features.     It  is  a  singular  coinci- 

were  collected  in  one  of  the  rooms  to  wait  till  the  shower  dence,  that  he  often  expressed  a  wish  for  such  a  fate, 

should  have  passed.     Otis,  with  his  cane  in  his  hand,  He  told  his  sister,  Mrs.  Warren,  after  his  reason  was 

stood  against  the  post  of  the  door  which  opened  from  impaired,  '  My  dear  sister,  I  hope  when  God  Almighty, 

this  apartment  into  the  front  entry.     He  was  in  the  act  in  his  righteous  providence  shall  take  me  out  of  time 

of  telling  the  assembled  group  a  story,  when  an  explo-  into  eternity,  that  it  will  be  by  a  flash  of  lighti.ing,'  and 

sion  took  place  which  seemed  to  shake  the  solid  earth,  this  wish  he  often  repeated. 

and  he  fell  without  a  struggle  or  a  word,  instantane-  Why  did  not  Mr.  Tudor  say  that  the  prayer  of  the 

ously  dead,  into  the  arms  of  Mr.  Osgood,  who,  seeing  great  patriot  had   been  answered  ?    The  Being  who 

him  falling,  sprang  forward  to  receive  him.     This  flash  '  hears  the  young  ravens  when  they  cry '  could  cer- 

of  lightning  was  the  first  that  came  from  the  cloud,  tainly  grant  the  desire  of  the  stricken  soul  of  the  great- 

and  was  not  followed  by  an  /  others  that  were  remark-  hearted  James  Otis. 

able.     There  were  seven  or  eight  persons  in  the  room,  a  The  Age  of  Bronze. 


188  HERO-  WORSHIP  IN  BIOGRAPHERS. 

tion.'  Even  Alexander  H.  Everett,  one  of  the  most  vigorous,  disciplined^ 
and  scholarly  men  of  the  past  generation,  says  :  '  The  accounts  that  have  been 
transmitted  to  us  of  the  actual  effects  of  Henry's  eloquence  on  the  minds  of  his 
hearers,  though  resting  apparently  on  the  best  authority,  seem  almost  fabulous, 
and  certainly  surpass  any  that  we  have  on  record  of  the  results  produced  by 
the  most  distinguished  orators  of  ancient  or  modern  Europe.  His  claim  to 
the  honor  of  having  given  the  first  impulse  to  the  revolutionary  movement,  is 
hardly  susceptible  of  a  satisfactory  solution,  since  no  event,  prior  to  the  battle 
of  Lexington,  and  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  was  so  decidedly  different 
in  character  from  a  variety  of  others  occurring  at  about  the  same  time,  as  to 
merit,  in  contradistinction  from  them,  the  praise  of  being  the  first  step  in  the 
progress  of  the  Revolution.  It  is  certain,  however,  that  in  one  of  the  two 
leading  colonies,  during  the  period  immediately  preceding  the  Revolution, 
Henry  was  constantly  in  advance  of  the  most  ardent  patriots  ;  and  that  he  sug- 
gested and  carried  into  effect,  by  his  immediate  personal  influence,  measures 
that  were  opposed  as  premature  and  violent,  by  all  the  other  eminent  sup- 
porters of  the  cause  of  liberty.' 

The  impatience  of  admiration  as  often  sways  the  judgment  of  the  bio- 
grapher, as  the  malice  of  prejudice  clouds  the  portrayals  of  the  defamer. 
But  there  must  needs  be  a  dash  of  hero-worship  in  the  good  biographer. 
This  quality  has  given  to  us  three  of  the  most  charming  biographies  ever 
written  :  Middleton's  Cicero,  Boswell's  Johnson,  and  Wirt's  Henry.  And 
it  is  well  that  this  is  so ;  for  without  it  the  world  would  be  in  a  sad  plight. 
Were  it  not  that  the  human  race  is  ready  to  recognize  and  adore  the  shining 
examples  of  virtue  which  adorn  the  ages,  the  green  places  of  the  earth  would 
become  bleak  moor  again ;  the  reservoirs  of  inspiration  and  hope  would  dry 
up,  and  we  should  be  turned  out  on  the  arid  desert.  It  is  a  blessed  thing 
that  the  messengers  of  gladness  and  salvation  which  heaven  sends  to  '  lure 
to  brighter  worlds  and  lead  the  way,'  find  so  cordial  a  greeting  when  they 
come.  It  is  more  blessed  still  that  traditions  borrowed  from  contempo- 
raries,* afterwards  raise  enduring  memorials  to  perpetuate  honored  names; 
and  thus  the  aggregate  of  valor  and  virtue  becomes  an  inexhaustible  treas- 
ure-house, from  which  successive  generations  draw  strength  and  consolation. 

The  justice  of  mankind  has  long  ago  accorded  to  the  Fathers  of  our  Re- 
public all  the  virtues  their  countrymen  have  ever  claimed  for  them  \  and 
within  our  own  times  the  world  is  reaping,  with  every  year,  a  larger  harvest 
from  their  achievements.  Their  names  and  their  history  are  so  well  known, 
that  in  an  historic  etching  like  this,  the  writer  has  only  to  trace  a  few  memo- 
rial lines,  and  a  full-length  portrait  stands  revealed  in  all  the  completeness 
find  glow  of  a  finished  picture,  as  Everett  dashed  it : — '  By  general  acknowl- 
edgment the  greatest  orator  of  his  day ;  elevated  by  his  transcendent  talents 
to  a  sort  of  supremacy  in  the  deliberative  assemblies  of  which  he  was  occa- 
sionally a  member,  and  the  courts  of  justice  in  which  he  exercised  his  profes* 
sion  ;  clothed,  whenever  he  chose  to  accept  them,  with  the  highest  executive 


YOUTH  OF  PATRICK  HENRY.  189 

functions  in  the  gift  of  the  people,  happy  in  his  domestic  relations  and  private 
circumstances — his  career  was  one  of  almost  unbroken  prosperity.  He  has  also 
been  eminently  fortunate  in  the  manner  in  which  the  history  of  his  life  has 
been  written  j  while  the  recollection  of  his  eloquence,  and  the  admiration  of  his 
character,  were  still  fresh  in  the  minds  of  numerous  surviving  contemporaries,  the 
task  of  collecting  and  recording  the  expressions  of  them  which  were  circulating 
in  conversation,  or  merely  .ephemeral  notes,  was  undertaken  by  one  whose  kin- 
dred eloquence  and  virtues,  rendered  him,  on  every  account,  the  fittest  person  to 
do  justice  to  the  subject'  And  even  so  able  a  man  as  Alexander  H.  Everett 
may  well  add  :  '  In  the  following  sketch  I  can  claim  little  other  merit  than 
that  of  condensing,  with  perhaps  some  few  not  very  important  modifications 
and  additions,  the  glowing  biography  of  Wirt.  Let  us  apply  to  his  work  the 
title  which  the  great  German  poet  Goethe,  prefixed  to  his  own  autobio- 
graphy,— Poetry  and  Truth.1  ' 

As  the  descendants  of  Abraham — the  founder  of  the  oldest  and  proudest 
aristocracy  on  the  globe,  in  whose  presence  the  puny  sprigs  of  Norman 
chivalry  dwindle  into  upstart  mushrooms — recur  with  equal  reverence  to  the 
sublime  messages  of  the  two  great  contemporary  prophets  of  Judah,  so  may 
we  find  in  Otis  and  Henry,  names  as  bright  and  sacred  to  us,  as  the  Jews  find 
in  Elijah  and  Elisha. 

Colonel  John  Henry,  the  father  of  Patrick,  was  a  strong,  well-born,  thor- 
oughly educated,  daring  Scotchman  of  Aberdeen.  'There  are  those  yet 
alive,'  said  Mr.  Pope  to  Wirt  in  1805,  '  who  have  seen  him  at  the  head  of  his 
regiment,  celebrating  the  birthday  of  George  III.,  with  as  much  enthusiasm 
as  his  son  Patrick  afterwards  displayed  in  resisting  the  encroachment  of  that 
monarch.' 

Wirt  tells  us  that  Patrick  was  passionately  addicted  to  the  sports  of  the 
field ;  wandered  the  forest  with  his  gun,  or  followed  the  brook  with  his  rod, 
thus  spending  whole  days  and  weeks,  his  appetite  rather  whetted  than  cloyed 
by  his  enjoyment.  He  would  not  study.  His  companions,  who  tried  with 
his  parents  to  urge  him  to  school,  declared  that  J  he  even  loved  idleness  for 
its  own  sake.'  This  love  of  solitude  characterized  his  youth.  With  a  hunting 
party  he  seldom  followed  the  noisy  band  that  drove  the  deer,  preferring  to  take 
his  stand  alone,  waiting  for  the  passing  game,  and  indulging  meanwhile  in  the 
luxury  of  thinking.  '  His  person  was  coarse,  his  manners  uncommonly 
awkward,  his  address  slovenly ;  his  conversation  very  plain ;  his  aversion  to 
study  invincible.  No  persuasion  could  bring  him  either  to  read  or  work  ;  he 
ran  wild  in  the  forest  like  one  of  the  aborigines  of  the  country.'  Wirt  remarks 
on  '  his  propensity  to  observe  and  comment  upon  human  character — a  pro- 
pensity that  seemed  to  have  been  born  with  him,  and  exerted  itself  instinc- 

1  The  narrative  carries  with  it  unquestionable  evi-  good  taste,  there  are  few  persons  of  eminence,  who, 

dence  of  authenticity,  as  well  in  the  known  character  of  after  reading  the  whole,  would  not  feel  the  wish  which 

the  writer,  as  in  the  authorities  that  are  cited  in  sup-  Queen  Katherine,  in  the  play,  expressed  in  regard  to 

port  of  every  important  statement ;  while  it  is  written  her  attendant,  Griffith — that  they  might  find  themselves 

with  so  much  warmth  and  elegance,  that  it  possesses  as  fond  and  faithful   a  chr.nicler. — Life  of  Patrick 

throughout,  all  th ;  charm  of  poetry,  and  perhaps  pro-  Henry,    by   Alexander    H.    Everett,    LL.D.      Vol.    i. 

duces    at  times  a  similar  illusion.     Although  some  few  Second   series  of    Spark' •    American  Biography,  pp 

passages  are  a  littl'  too  highly  colored  for  the  eye  of  211-12. 


1 90  HENR  Y'S  PO  VER  TY  AND  EARL  V  STR  UGGLES. 

tively  the  moment  that  a  new  subject  was  presented  to  his  view.  Its  action  was 
incessant,  and  it  became,  at  length,  almost  the  only  intellectual  exercise  in 
which  he  seemed  to  take  delight.'  No  wonder  that  to  this  cause  his  biogra- 
pher traced  ■  that  consummate  knowledge  in  the  human  heart  which  he  finally 
attained,  and  which  enabled  him,  when  he  came  upon  the  public  stage,  to 
touch  the  springs  of  passion  with  a  master-hand,  and  control  the  resolutions 
and  decisions  of  his  hearers  with  a  power  almost  more  than  mortal.'  Of 
course,  education,  as  the  term  is  commonly  used,  had  little  or  nothing  to  dc 
with  the  formation  of  his  mind.  ■  He  was,  indeed,  a  mere  child  of  nature ; 
and  she  seems  to  have  been  too  proud  and  jealous  of  her  work,  to  permit  it 
to  be  touched  by  the  hand  of  art.  She  gave  him  Shakspeare's  genius,  and 
bade  him,  like  Shakspeare,  depend  on  that  alone.'  * 

His  father  tried  to  make  him  a  merchant.  He  might  as  well  have  tried 
to  turn  a  St.  Bernard  dog  into  a  poodle.  He  learned  the  meaning  of  £  s.  d. 
under  the  teaching  of  hard  knocks, — the  very  best  way  to  learn  it, — for  if  it 
comes  by  intuition  it  makes  a  man  mean  for  life,  and  mean  forever.  One 
thing  he  understood ;  he  found  his  mate,  and  married  at  eighteen.  She  was 
the  daughter  of  an  honest,  poor  farmer ;  but  they  loved  each  other,  and 
while  they  were  struggling  hard  for  a  subsistence  on  a  small  farm,  with  no 
help  except  one  or  two  slaves,  a  group  of  beautiful  children  came  blushing 
along  their  pathway  to  brighten  a  life  of  hard  work.  '  Little,'  says  Wirt, 
'  could  the  wealthy  and  great  of  the  land,  as  they  rode  along  the  highway  in 
splendor,  and  beheld  the  young  rustic  at  work,  in  the  coarse  garb  of  a  laborer, 
covered  with  dust,  and  melting  in  the  sun,  have  suspected  that  this  was  the 
man  who  was  destined  not  only  to  humble  their  pride,  but  to  make  the  prince 
himself  tremble  on  his  distant  throne,  and  to  shake  the  brightest  jewels  from 
the  British  crown.  Little,  indeed,  could  he  himself  have  suspected  it ;  for 
amidst  the  distresses  which  thickened  around  him  at  this  time,  and  threatened 
him,  not  only  with  obscurity  but  with  famine,  no  hopes  came  to  cheer  the 
gloom ;  nor  did  there  remain  to  him  any  earthly  consolation,  save  that  which 
he  found  in  the  bosom  of  his  own  family.  Fortunately  for  him,  there  never 
was  a  heart  which  felt  this  consolation  with  greater  force.  No  man  ever  pos- 
sessed the  domestic  virtues  in  a  higher  degree,  or  enjoyed  more  exquisitely 
those  pure  delights  which  flow  from  the  endearing  relations  of  conjugal  life.' 

Wirt. drops  a  remark  to  which  I  attach  a  good  deal  more  importance  than 
he  seems  to  have  done.  Henry  was  passionately  fond  of  music,  and  in  it 
found  alleviation  from  poverty  and  hard,  every-day  labor.  He  failed  at  his  farm, 
and  had  to  sell  out  at  a  sacrifice  for  cash.  Once  more  he  tried  merchandise, 
and  once  more  failed.  Borne  down  by  poverty,  but  not  crushed,  he  would 
seize  his  violin,  and  set  the  children  to  dancing.     Till  late  into  the  night,  he 

1  Let  not    the   youthful    reader,   however,    deduce  those  pernicious  habits  :  through  what  yeaYs  of  poverty 

from  the    example    of   Mr.    Henry  an    argument    in  and  wretchedness  they  doomed  him  to  struggle  ;  and, 

favor  of  indolence  and  a  contempt  of  study.     Let  him  let  him  remember,  that  at  length,  when  in  the  zenith  of 

remember  that  the  powers  which  surmounted  the  dis-  his  glory,  Mr.  Henry  himself  had  frequent  occasion  to 

advantage  of  those  early  habits,  were  such  as  very  deplore  the  consequences  of  his  early  neglect  of  liter*., 

rarely  appear  upon  this  earth.    Let  him  remember,  too,  ture,  and  bewail  the  ghosts  of  his  departed  hours.— 

how  long  the  genius,  even  of  Mr.  Henry,  was  kept  Wirt's  Henry. 
down  and  hidden  from  public  view,  by  the  sorcery  of 


HENRY  IS  ADMITTED  TO  THE  BAR.  191 

consoled  himself  with  his  flute.     Again,  whole  days  he  would  spend  in  the 
sports  of  the  forest,  leaving  his  store  to  take  care  of  itself. 

But  this  thing  was  not  to  last  always.  He  was  attacked  with  a  fit  of  study. 
He  began  geography,  and  '  through  life  was  an  adept  at  it.'  It  was  an  ex- 
cellent thing  for  him  that  he  had  no  more  books.  He  was  a  fine  illustration 
of  what  can  be  done  with  the  motto,  multum,  non  multa,  for  judicious  and  pro- 
fitable reading.  He  mastered  the  best  historical  books  in  existence.  He  had 
the  republics  of  Rome  and  Greece,  and  the  struggles  of  liberty  through  all 
ages,  at  the  ends  of  his  fingers.  As  for  religion,  reverence  was  the  mightiest 
element  in  his  character.  He  hated  sectarianism,  but  he  loved  religion.  His 
lifelong  favorites  were  Soame  Jenyns,  Philip  Doddridge,  and  Joseph  Butler, 
whose  Analogy  delighted  him.  In  his  old  age,  he  published,  at  his  own  ex- 
pense, for  gratuitous  distribution  among  the  people,  an  edition  of  Jenyns' 
'View  of  the  Internal  Evidences  of  Christianity.'  The  churches  were  not  large 
enough  for  him — but  Christianity  was  just  large  enough  to  fill  his  whole  soul  ; 
and  at  different  periods  of  life  his  occasional  bursts  of  eloquence  and  feeling 
on  this  sublime  theme,  and  on  the  life  to  come,  amazed  and  melted  his  hearers. 

At  last,  so  far  as  worldly  fortune  or  misfortune  goes,  Henry  had  reached 
the  bottom  of  the  hill.  Every  atom  of  his  property  was  gone,  and  his  friends 
could  assist  him  no  further.  *  He  had  tried  every  means  of  support  of  which 
he  could  suppose  himself  capable,  and  every  one  had  failed.  Ruin  was  be- 
hind him ;  poverty,  debt,  want,  and  famine  before  him ;  and  as  if  his  cup  of 
misery  were  not  already  full  enough,  there  were  a  suffering  wife  and  children 
to  make  it  overflow.'  In  other  words  :  Nature  had  undertaken  to  bring  up 
Patrick  Henry,  and  her  work  was  complete.  If  there  is  any  meaning  in  what 
the  vulgar  say  about  the  wheel  of  fortune,  its  next  revolution  was  bound  to 
bring  him  to  the  top.  He  dashed  at  the  law,  and  studied  it ;  some  say  six 
weeks,  and  others  three  or  four  months — it  matters  not  which.  The  late, 
and  richly  gifted  Alvan  Stuart,  was  asked  by  the  judges,  when  he  appeared 
for  admission  to  the  bar,  how  long  he  had  studied.  He  answered,  '  I  slept 
on  Blackstone  last  night ;  please  examine  me  this  morning.'  Such  men  are 
born  with  whole  codes  of  jurisprudence  in  their  heads.  Henry  knew  nothing 
about  the  forms  of  procedure,  nor  even  the  nomenclature  of  the  profession.1 
But  he  was  to  become  the  advocate  of  the  people  ;  the  lawyer  of  the  million. 
He  suffered,  it  is  true,  frequent  embarrassment,  and  sometimes  deep  mortifi- 
cation from  the  lack  of  literary  training,  and  a  knowledge  of  detail ;  but  with 
powers  of  intense  application,  he  mastered  those  difficulties  as  fast  as  they  rose. 

His  first  case  became  famous  as  'the  Parson's  case' — an  action  brought 
in  the  County  Court  of  Hanover,  by  Rev.  James  Maury,  for  the  recovery  of 
damages  for  non-payment  of  certain  quantities  of  tobacco  alleged  to  be  due 
to  him  by  due  provision  of  a  law  of  the  State  on  account  of  his  salary.     Old 

1  Of  the  science  of  law,  he  knew  almost  nothing  ;  business  of  his  profession,  even  of  the  mode  of  ordering 
of  the  practical  part  he  was  so  wholly  ignorant,  that  he  a  suit,  giving  a  notice,  or  making  a  motion  in  court- 
was  not  only  unable  to  draw  a  declaration  or  a  plea,  Wirt*  s  Henry,  p.  36. 
but  incapable,  it  is  said,  of  the  most  common  or  simple 


1 02  HENRY'S  TRIUMPH  IN  THE  PARSON'S  CASE. 

statutes  of  the  colony,  and  precedents  were  all  on  the  side  of  the  clergy 
But  this  made  no  difference  with  the  people,  who  abhorred  the  idea  of 
Church  and  State,  or  any  legal  oppression  growing  out  of  it. 

In  defiance  of  all  precedent,  as  well  as  law,  and  against  the  advice  and 
entreaty  of  his  own  father,  and  the  intimidations  of  the  whole  aristocratic  class 
— embracing  the  State  clergy  and  the  proverbial  first  families  of  Virginia — he 
appeared  for  the  people.  The  aristocracy,  and  the  clergy  in  particular, 
from  all  the  neighboring  counties  came  out  in  great  force.  Among  them  was 
the  orator's  uncle.  Henry  ran  out  to  the  carriage,  and  told  his  uncle  he  was 
sorry  to  see  him  there,  ■  because  I  fear  that  as  I  have  never  yet  spoken  in 
public,  I  shall  be  too  much  overawed  by  your  presence  to  do  justice  to  my 
clients  ;  and  besides,  I  shall  be  under  the  necessity  of  saying  some  hard  things 
of  the  clergy,  which  it  may  be  unpleasant  for  you  to  hear.'  '  Why,  Patrick,' 
said  the  old  gentleman,  with  a  good-natured  smile,  '  as  to  your  saying  hard 
things  of  the  clergy,  I  advise  you  to  be  cautious,  as  you  will  be  more  likely  to 
injure  your  cause,  than  theirs.  As  to  my  leaving  the  ground,  I  fear,  my  boy, 
that  with  such  a  cause  to  defend,  my  presence  will  do  you  here  little  harm  or 
good.  Since,  however,  you  seem  to  think  otherwise,  and  desire  it  of  me  so 
earnestly,  you  shall  be  gratified.'     And  the  good  old  uncle  rode  home. 

1  Now,'  says  Wirt,  '  came  on  the  first  trial  of  Patrick  Henry's  strength.'  The 
court-house  was  crowded  with  an  overwhelming  multitude,  and  an  immense 
and  anxious  throng  without,  were  listening  at  every  door  and  window.  To 
make  it  worse  for  the  poor  young  advocate,  his  own  father  was  the  presiding 
judge.  Henry  rose  awkwardly  and  blundered  through  a  brief  exordium  ;  a 
supercilious  smile  played  along  the  benches  where  the  formidable  array  of  the 
clergy  confronted  him  ;  a  feeling  of  mortification  went  through  the  house  ; 
his  father  almost  sunk  with  confusion  from  his  seat.  '  Now,'  says  his  biographer, 
'were  those  wonderful  faculties  which  he  possessed,  for  the  first  time  de- 
veloped ;  and  now  was  first  witnessed  that  mysterious  and  almost  supernatural 
transformation  of  appearance,  which  the  fire  of  his  own  eloquence  never 
failed  to  work  in  him.  For  as  his  mind  rolled  along,  and  began  to  glow  from 
its  own  action,  all  the  exuvioz  of  the  clown  seemed  to  shed  themselves  spon- 
taneously. His  attitude,  by  degrees,  became  erect  and  lofty.  The  spirit  of 
his  genius  awakened  all  his  features.  His  countenance  shone  with  a  noble- 
ness and  a  grandeur,  which  it  had  never  before  exhibited.  There  was  a  light- 
ning in  his  eyes  which  seemed  to  rivet  the  spectator.  His  action  became  grace- 
ful, bold,  and  commanding  ;  and  in  the  tones  of  his  voice,  but  more  especially 
in  his  emphasis,  there  was  a  peculiar  charm,  a  magic,  of  which  any  one  who 
ever  heard  him  will  speak  as  soon  as  he  is  named,  but  of  which  no  one  can 
give  any  adequate  description.  They  can  only  say  that  it  struck  upon  the 
ear  and  upon  the  heart,  in  a  manner  which  language  camiot  tell.  Add  to  all 
this  his  wonder-working  fancy,  and  the  peculiar  phraseology  in  which  he 
clothed  his  images  ;  for  he  painted  to  the  heart  with  a  force  that  almost  petri- 
fied it.  In  the  language  of  those  who  heard  him  on  this  occasion,  he  made 
their  blood  run  eold,  and  their  hair  to  rise  on  end.  ...     In  less  than  twenty 


HIS  ELECTION  TO  THE  HOUSE  OF  BURGESSES.  193 

minutes,  they  might  be  seen,  in  every  part  of  the  house,  on  every  bench,  in 
every  window,  stooping  forward  from  their  stands,  in  death-like  silence  ;  their 
features  fixed  in  amazement  and  awe ;  all  their  senses  listening  and  riveted 
upon  the  speaker,  as  if  to  catch  the  last  strain  of  some  heavenly  visitant. 
The  mockery  of  the  clergy  was  soon  turned  into  alarm  ;  their  triumph  into 
confusion  and  despair  ;  and  at  one  burst  of  his  rapid  and  overwhelming  in- 
vective, they  fled  from  the  bench  in  precipitation  and  terror.  As  for  the 
father,  such  was  his  surprise,  such  his  amazement,  such  his  rapture,  that,  for- 
getting where  he  was,  and  the  character  he  was  filling,  tears  of  ecstasy  streamed 
down  his  cheeks,  without  the  power  or  inclination  to  repress  them.' 

The  bewildered  jurymen  were  swept  away  with  statutes  and  precedents, 
and  at  once  brought  in  a  verdict  of  one  penny  damages.  The  last  nail  in  the 
coffin  of  Church  and  State  in  the  Thirteen  Colonies  had  been  driven  home. 
From  this  hour  Patrick  Henry  led  the  bar  of  Virginia,  till  he  retired  from  it, 
covered  with  honors. 

I  need  not  dwell  upon  his  long,  brilliant  career;  it  will  be  enough  to 
touch  upon  two  or  three  passages.  Time  went  by.  The  call  of  Massa- 
chusetts for  the  first  National  Congress  had  reached  Virginia,  and  Henry  was 
elected  a  member  of  the  House  of  Burgesses,  which  alone  could  choose  dele- 
gates. He  was  among  the  youngest  and  least  experienced  of  the  body,  but 
the  fame  of  'the  Parson's  case'  had  filled  the  State.  Those  only  who  had 
heard  of  that  wonderful  argument,  had  any  just  conception  of  his  transcend- 
ent power ;  nor  among  them  all  could  there  have  been  a  single  man  who 
suspected  the  breadth,  the  strength,  and  ihe  prophetic  glance  of  his  states- 
manship. In  the  House  of  Burgesses  were  such  men  as  Richard  Henry 
Lee,  Pendleton,  Wythe,  Bland,  Fleming,  Johnston,  Fairfax,  and  a  score  of 
others,  who  were  to  become  illustrious  in  the  field  and  senate,  among  the 
mighty  host  of  great  men  then  coming  forward  in  the  conflict  of  debate,  the 
collisions  of  diplomacy,  and  the  strife  of  battle ;  and  to  them  he  was  to  show 
that  men  are  born  statesmen  and  lawyers,  as  well  as  poets. 

A  word  on  the  political  feeling  of  the  State  of  Virginia :  Bancroft  and 
all  historians  agree  that  Virginia  received  the  news  of  the  British  plan  to  tax 
America  with  consternation,  to  be  soon  followed  by  a  deeper  feeling.  The 
planters,  foreboding  ruin  to  their  business,  resolved  that  the  act  should  re- 
coil on  England.  For  the  first  time,  they  began  to  approve  of  frugality, 
and  be  proud  of  it.  '  Articles  of  luxury,  of  English  manufacture,  were  ban- 
ished, and  threadbare  coats  were  most  in  fashion.'  But  although  indignation 
had  spread  through  the  State,  yet  no  one  had,  up  to  this  time,  breathed  a 
thought  of  the  independence  of  the  Colonies.  The  hour  was  drawing  near  for 
the  enforcement  of  the  Stamp  Act.  For  several  weeks  Henry  had  suppressed 
the  passions  which  burned  in  his  soul.  Older  statesmen  were  cautious,  lest 
their  loyalty  should  be  suspected.  All  the  other  colonies,  through  timid  hesi- 
tation, or  the  want  of  opportunity,  still  remained  silent.'  Patrick  Henry  dis- 
dained submission.  No  response  was  likely  to  be  sent  back  to  Massachusetts. 
The  session  was  drawing  to  a  close,  and  a  maioritv  of  the  members  made  ar» 
H 


1 94  HENR  Y'S  FIVE  RESOL  UTIONS. 

excuse  for  leaving,  since  there  was  an  apprehension  that  some  rash  measures 
might  be  proposed.  *  Alone,  a  burgess  of  but  a  few  clays,  unadvised  and  un- 
assisted, in  an  auspicious  moment,  of  which  the  recollection  cheered  him  to 
his  latest  day,  he  came  forward  in  the  committee  of  the  whole  House,  and 
while  Thomas  Jefferson,  a  young  collegian  from  the  mountain  frontier,  stood 
outside  of  the  closed  hall,  eager  to  catch  the  first  tidings  of  resistance,  and 
George  Washington,  as  is  believed,  was  in  his  place  as  a  member,  he  main- 
tained his  resolutions.' l 

These  Immortal  '  Resolutions,'  as  Jefferson  called  them,  must  have  their 
place  here.  After  his  death,  Wirt  informs  us,  they  were  found,  in  his  own 
handwriting,  sealed,  the  envelope  thus  endorsed  : — '  Enclosed  are  the 
Resolutions  of  the  Virginia  Assembly,  in  1765,  concerning  the 
Stamp  Act.     Let  my  Executors  open  this  Paper.' 

*  Resolved,  That  the  first  adventurers  and  settlers  of  this  his  majesty's  col- 
ony and  dominion,  brought  with  them,  and  transmitted  to  their  posterity,  and 
all  other  his  majesty's  subjects,  since  inhabiting  in  this  his  majesty's  said  col- 
ony, all  the  privileges,  franchises,  and  immunities,  that  have  at  any  time  been 
held,  enjoyed,  and  possessed,  by  the  people  of  Great  Britain. 
.  '  Resolved,  That  by  two  royal  charters,  granted  by  King  James  the  First, 
the  colonists  aforesaid,  are  declared  entitled  to  all  the  privileges,  liberties,  and 
immunities  of  denizens  and  natural-born  subjects,  to  all  intents  and  purposes, 
as  if  they  had  been  abiding  and  born  within  the  realm  of  England. 

1  Resolved,  That  the  taxation  of  the  people  by  themselves,  or  by  persons 
chosen  by  themselves  to  represent  them,  who  can  only  know  what  taxes  the 
people  are  able  to  bear,  and  the  easiest  mode  of  raising  them,  and  are  equally 
affected  by  such  taxes  themselves,  is  the  distinguishing  characteristics  of  Brit- 
ish freedom,  and  without  which  the  ancient  constitution  cannot  subsist. 

lResolved,  That  his  majesty's  liege  people  of  this  most  ancient  colony,  have 
uninterruptedly  enjoyed  the  right  of  being  thus  governed  by  their  own  Assem- 
bly, in  the  article  of  their  taxes  and  internal  police,  and  that  the  same  hath 
never  been  forfeited,  or  any  other  way  given  up,  but  hath  been  constantly 
recognized  by  the  King  and  people  of  Great  Britain. 

1  Resolved,  therefore,  That  the  General  Assembly  of  this  colony  have  the 
sole  right  and  power  to  lay  taxes  and  impositions  upon  the  inhabitants  of  this 
colony  ;  and  that  every  attempt  to  vest  such  power  in  any  person  or  persons 
whatsoever,  other  than  the  General  Assembly  aforesaid,  has  a  tendency  to 
destroy  British  as  well  as  American  freedom.' 

Mr.  Wirt  discovered  these  resolutions  in  Henry's  autograph  : — ■  The 
within  resolutions  passed  the  House  of  Burgesses  in  May,  1765.  They  formed 
the  first  opposition  to  the  Stamp  Act,  and  the  scheme  of  taxing  America  by 
the  British  Parliament.  All  the  Colonies,  either  through  fear  or  want  of  op- 
portunity  to  form  an  opposition,  or  from  influence  of  some  kind  or  other, 
had  remained  silent.     I  had  been  for  the  first  time  elected  a  burgess  a  few 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  v.  p.  275. 


TERRIFIC  POWER  OF  HENRY'S  ELOQUENCE.  195 

days  before  ;  was  young  and  inexperienced,  unacquainted  with  the  forms  of 
the  House,  and  the  members  that  composed  it.  Finding  the  men  of  weight 
averse  to  opposition,  and  the  commencement  of  the  tax  at  hand,  and  that  no 
person  was  likely  to  step  forth,  I  determined  to  venture,  and  alone,  unadvised, 
and  unassisted,  on  a  blank  leaf  of  an  old  law-book,  [Judge  Tyler  says  an  old 
Coke  upon  Littleton]  wrote  the  within.  Upon  offering  them  to  the  house 
violent  debates  ensued,  many  threats  were  uttered,  and  much  abuse  cast  on 
me  by  the  party  for  submission.  After  a  long  and  warm  contest,  the  resolu- 
tions passed  by  a  very  small  majority,  perhaps  of  one  or  two  only.  The 
alarm  spread  throughout  America  with  astonishing  quickness  and  the  minis- 
terial party  were  overwhelmed — the  great  point  of  resistance  to  British  taxation 
was  universally  established  in  the  colonies.  This  brought  on  the  war  which 
finally  separated  the  two  countries,  and  gave  independence  to  ours.  Whether 
this  will  prove  a  blessing  or  a  curse,  will  depend  upon  the  use  our  people 
make  of  the  blessing  which  a  gracious  God  hath  bestowed  on  us.  If  they  are 
wise,  they  will  be  great  and  happy.  If  they  are  of  a  contrary  character,  they 
will  be  miserable.  Righteousness  alone  can  exalt  them  as  a  nation.  Reader, 
whoever  thou  art,  remember  this  ;  and  in  thy  sphere,  practise  virtue  thyself, 
and  encourage  it  in  others.     Patrick  Henry.'  ' 

'By  these  resolutions'  2  says  Mr.  Jefferson,  who  was  an  eye-witness  of  the 
scene,  '  and  his  manner  of  supporting  them,  Mr.  Henry  took  the  lead  out  of 
the  hands  of  those  who  had  heretofore  guided  the  proceedings  of  the  house  ; 
that  is  to  say,  of  Pendleton,  Wythe,  Bland,  Randolph.'  '  It  was,'  continues 
Wirt,  '  indeed  the  measure  which  raised  him  to  the  zenith  of  his  glory.  He 
had  never  before  had  a  subject  which  entirely  matched  his  genius,  and  was 
capable  of  drawing  out  all  the  powers  of  his  mind.  It  was  remarked  of  him 
throughout  his  life,  that  his  talents  never  failed  to  rise  with  the  occasion,  and 
in  proportion  with  the  resistance  which  he  had  to  encounter.  The  nicety  of  the 
vote  on  his  last  resolution,  proves  that  it  was  not  a  time  to  hold  in  reserve  any 
part  of  his  forces.  It  was  indeed  an  Alpine  passage,  under  circumstances  even 
more  unpropitious  than  those  of  Hannibal ;  for  he  had  not  only  to  fight,  hand 
to  hand,  the  powerful  party  who  were  already  in  possession  of  the  heights,  but 

1  Wirt's  Henry,  pp.  75-76.  proceeding.     But,  on  the  other  side,  George  Johnston, 

2  Such  was  the  Declaration  of  colonial  rights,  of  Fairfax,  reasoned  with  solidity  and  firmness,  and 
adopted  at  his  instance  by  the  Assembly  of  Virginia.  Henry  flamed  with  impasioned  zeal ;  .  .  .  Henry's 
It  followed  from  these  resolutions  that  the  General  As-  resolutions  were  reported,  and  on  the  30th  of  May,  by  a 
sembly  of  the  whole  colony  have  the  sole  right  and  vote  of  twenty  to  nineteen  they  passed  into  the  his- 
power  to  lay  taxes  on  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony,  and  tory  of  Virginia's  record.  '  I  would  have  given  five 
that  any  attempt  to  vest  such  power  in  any  other  per-  hundred  guineas  for  a  single  vote,'  exclaimed  the 
son  whatever  tended  to  destroy  British  as  well  as  Attorney-General  aloud,  as  he  came  out  past  young 
American  freedom  ;  that  the  inhabitants  of  Virginia  Jefferson,  into  whose  youthful  soul  the  proceedings  of 
were  not  bound  to  yield  obedience  to  any  law  designed  that  day  sunk  so  deeply  that  resistance  to  tyranny  be- 
to  impose  taxation  upon  them  other  than  the  laws  of  came  a  part  of  his  nature.  But  Henry  carried  all  the 
their  own  General  Assembly,  and  that  any  one  who  young  men  with  him.  That  night,  thinking  his  work 
should,  either  by  speaking  or  writing,  maintain  the  done,  he  rode  home;  but  the  next  day,  in  his  absence,  an 
contrary  should  be  deemed  an  enemy  to  the  colony.  attempt  was  made  to  strike  all  the  resolutions  off  the 

A  stormy   debate  arose  ;    and   many   threats  were  journals,  and  the  fifth  only  was  blotted  out.     But  they 

uttered.      Robinson,  the  speaker,  already  a  defaulter,  were  published  in  all  the  newspapers  of  America,  and 

Peyton  Randolph,  the  king's  attorney,  and  the  frank,  it  placed  the   Old  Dominion   in   the   front  of  the  ap- 

honest,  and  independent    Jeorge  Wythe,  a  lover  of  proaching  rebellion.     *  This  is  the  way  the  fire  began 

classic  learning,  accustomed  to  guide  the    house  by  in  Virginia,'  said  John   Hughes   in  his   letter   to   the 

his  strong  understanding  and  single-minded  integrity,  Boston  Gazette  of  September   22d,    1766.       '  Virginia 

exerted   all   their  powers  to  moderate  the  tone  of  the  rang  the  alarm  bell,'  said  Bernard  to  Halifax.     '  Vir- 

'  hot  and  virulent  resolutions  ; '  while  John  Randolph,  ginia  gave   the   signal  for  the  continent,   said   Gage  t* 

Ihe  best  lawyer  in  the  colony,  singly  resisted  the  whole  Conway.'— Bancroft,  vol.  v.  p.  276. 


196  HE  REACHES  THE  SUMMIT  OF  GLORY. 

at  the  same  instant  to  cheer  and  animate  the  timid  band  of  followers,  that 
were  trembling,  and  fainting,  and  drawing  back  below  him.  It  was  an  occasion 
that  called  upon  him  to  put  forth  all  his  strength,  and  he  did  put  it  forth  in  such 
a  manner  as  man  never  did  before.  The  cords  of  argument  with  which  his 
adversaries  frequently  flattered  themselves  that  they  had  bound  him  fast,  be- 
came packthreads  in  his  hands.  He  burst  them  with  as  much  ease  as  the  un- 
shorn Samson  did  the  bands  of  the  Philistines.  He  seized  the  pillars  of  the 
temple,  shook  them  terribly,  and  seemed  to  threaten  his  opponents  with  ruin. 
It  was  an  incessant  storm  of  lightning  and  thunder,  which  struck  them 
aghast.  The  faint-hearted  gathered  courage  from  his  countenance,  and  cow- 
ards became  heroes  while  they  gazed  on  his  exploits. 

*  It  was  in  the  midst  of  this  magnificent  debate,  while  he  was  descanting 
on  the  tyranny  of  the  obnoxious  act,  that  he  exclaimed  with  a  voice  of  thun- 
der, and  with  a  look  of  a  god,  "  Caesar  had  his  Brutus — Charles  the  First,  his 
Cromwell,  and  George  the  Third — ["  Treason  !"  cried  the  Speaker — "Trea- 
son, treason  ! '  echoed  from  every  part  of  the  house.  It  was  one  of  those  try- 
ing moments  which  is  decisive  of  character.  Henry  faltered  not  for  an  in- 
stant ;  but  rising  to  a  loftier  attitude,  and  fixing  on  the  Speaker  an  eye  of  the 
most  determined  fire,  he  finished  his  sentence  with  the  firmest  emphasis,] 
may  profit  by  their  example.     If  this  be  treason,  make  the  most  of  it."  ' 

*  It  is  not  wonderful,'  Mr.  Wirt  appropriately  adds  : — '  That  even  the 
friends  of  colonial  rights  who  knew  the  feeble  and  defenceless  situation  of 
this  country,  should  be  startled  at  a  step  so  bold  and  daring.  That  effect  was 
produced  ;  and  the  resolutions  were  resisted,  not  only  by  the  aristocracy  of 
the  house,  but  by  many  of  those  who  were  afterwards  distinguished  among 
the  brightest  champions  of  American  liberty. 

1  From  this  period  Mr.  Henry  became  the  idol  of  the  people  of  Virginia  ; 
nor  was  his  name  confined  to  his  native  State.  His  light  and  heat  were  seen 
and  felt  throughout  the  continent,  and  he  was  everywhere  regarded  as  the 
great  champion  of  colonial  liberty.  The  impulse  thus  given  by  Virginia  was 
caught  by  the  other  colonies.  His  resolutions  were  everywhere  adopted  with 
progressive  variations.  The  spirit  of  resistance  became  bolder  and  bolder, 
until  the  whole  continent  was  in  a  flame ;  and  by  the  first  of  November, 
when  the  Stamp  Act  was,  according  to  its  provisions,  to  have  taken  effect,  its 
execution  had  become  utterly  impracticable.' * 

I  have  thus  brought  into  the  foreground  a  few  of  the  chief  figures  which 
hold  their  sentinel  stations  along  the  border-land  of  our  pre-Revolutionary  his- 
tory. I  chose  them  because,  in  their  separate  spheres,  they  all  acted  nobly  the 
principal  parts  which  Providence  assigned  them.     It  was  not  an  easy  matter 

1  Wirt's  Henry,   pp.  83-85.     The  Revolution  may  the  volcano  was  still  audible,  and  the  smoke  of  the 

be  truly  said  to  have  commenced  with  his  resolutions  crater,  continually  ascending,  mingled  not  unfrequently 

in  1765.     From  that  period  not  an  hour  of  settled  peace  with  ignited  matter,  which  announced  a  new  and  more 

had  existed  between  the  two  countries.     It  is  true  that  terrible  explosion.     These  were  the  times  that  tried  the 

the  eruption  produced  by  the  Stamp  Act  had  subsided  souls  of  men,  and  never  in  any  country  or  in  any  age 

with  its  repeal,    and   the  people   had    resumed   their  did  there  exist  a  race  of  men  whose  souls  were  better 

ancient  settlements  and  occupations  ;  but  there   was  fitted  to  endure  trial. — Wirt's  Henry,  p.  1C3. 
to  peace  of  the  heart  or  of  the  mind.    The  rumbling  of 


INSTITUTIONS  OF  LEARNING  IN  THE  COLONIES.  19? 

among  'so  great  a  cloud  of  witnesses'  to  choose  wisely,  where  so  many 
had  been  called,  and  so  few  could  be  chosen.  But  my  reader  will  probably 
agree  with  me  that  these  men  whose  careers  I  have  thus  so  inadequately 
traced,  represent  the  true  spirit  and  thoughts  of  that  interesting  period 
which  immediately  preceded  the  approaching  contest  for  the  vindication  of 
American  principles,  on  which  the  future  welfare  of  mankind  was  so  much  to 
depend. 

SECTION  SIXTH. 

INSTITUTIONS    OF   LEARNING    IN   THE    COLONIES. 

While  the  volcano  is  sleeping,  and  before  the  eruption  takes  place,  let  us 
turn  to  some  subjects  of  calmer  contemplation.  We  shall  better  understand 
the  work  our  fathers  had  before  them,  and  how  they  did  it,  if  we  glance  at 
those  institutions  of  learning  where  the  blessed  lights  of  knowledge  had  long 
been  beaming.  We  must  see  where  the  Fathers  of  the  Republic  were  edu- 
cated ;  where  the  guiding  minds  of  that  signal  period  were  shaped :  for  be  it 
never  forgotten  that  the  American  Revolution  was  not  the  frantic  ravings  of  a 
mob ;  nor  the  sudden  ebullitions  of  the  blind  rage  of  an  ignorant  multitude  ; 
it  was  not  the  fruit  of  unguided  zeal,  or  vulgar  passion.  It  was  the  result  of 
long  thinking,  of  calm  reasoning,  of  profound  judicial  knowledge.  It  was  the 
work  of  an  intelligence  higher  and  deeper  than  had  given  birth  to  any  other 
revolution  which  was  so  materially  to  change  the  political  institutions  and 
social  condition  of  a  whole  people,  or  put  forth  so  wide  an  influence  upon 
the  fortunes  of  other  nations. 

I  attach  an  importance  beyond  all  power  of  expression,  to  those  nine  Col- 
leges which  educated  the  generation  of  men  who  achieved  our  independence, 
and  laid  the  foundations  of  our  government.  To  them  we  owe  a  debt  of 
gratitude  we  never  can  pay,  except  by  furnishing  such  generous  aid  as  the 
opulence  of  our  age  can  so  readily  give,  to  enrich  the  resources,  and  expand 
the  sphere  of  usefulness  of  these  nursing  mothers  of  the  Romuli  of  the  Re- 
public. While  the  vast  sums  which  are  now  being  given  with  a  munificence 
for  which  regal  is  no  name,  to  found  new  schools  of  learning,  it  is  a 
subject  of  perhaps  still  livelier  congratulation  that  these  venerable  shrines, 
which  have  been  hallowed  by  the  votive  offerings  of  former  generations,  are 
now  rising  in  new  strength  and  splendor.  And  although  some  readers  may 
find  little  to  interest  them  in  the  records  of  these  colleges  which  I  shall  now 
give,  yet  I  believe  that  the  great  proportion  of  those  who  will  go  with  me 
through  these  historic  fields,  will  find  the  scenes  we  now  enter  for  a  brief 
interval  by  no  means  the  least  inviting  portion  of  our  colonial  history. 

Impressed  with  the  special  importance  of  extreme  accuracy  in  memorials 
so  brief,  I  solicited  the  aid  of  the  Librarians  of  the  institutions  I  speak  of, 


19*  THE  FIRST  AMERICAN  COLLEGE  FOUNDED. 

and  I  now  return  to  those  learned  and  polite  men  my  sincere  thanks  for  the 
pains  they  have  taken  in  the  thorough  revision  of  my  proofsheets,  all  of  which 
passed  through  their  hands.  Especially  am  I  grateful  for  their  correction  of 
the  mistakes  I  made  by  following  the  best  previous  authorities,  as  well  as 
for  furnishing  the  latest  information  concerning  the  institutions  of  which 
they  are  the  vigilant  watchmen. 

Harvard  College. — The  first  institution  of  classical  learning  established  in 
America  was  Harvard  College,  at  the  village  of  Newtown,  in  Massachu- 
setts. It  has,  during  the  lapse  of  nearly  two  centuries  and  a  half,  grown  into 
so  noble  an  institution,  and  has  poured  such  beneficent  streams  of  light  over 
the  continent,  that  it  is  deserving  of  far  more  space  than  we  can  accord  to 
its  history. 

The  enlightened  founders  of  the  New  England  colonies,  were  men  of 
learning  and  culture.  They  comprehended  the  office  of  education  in  its 
relation  to  the  well-being  of  the  State,  and  from  the  28th  day  of  October, 
1636,  only  eight  years  after  the  first  landing  of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  colo- 
nists under  John  Endicot,  the  General  Court  at  Boston  voted  four  hundred 
pounds  towards  a  college  which  should  secure  the  education  of  young  men 
in  the  higher  departments  of  learning.  Two  years  later,  the  name  Newtown 
was  changed  to  Cambridge,  •  in  gratitude  to  the  English  University,  where 
some  of  the  founders  of  the  young  American  school  had  been  educated. 
The  first  considerable  bequest  was  from  John  Harvard,  a  learned  English 
clergyman,  wlio  had  reached  the  colony  only  the  previous  year.  Before  the 
institution  was  two  years  old,  it  had  received  from  this  beneficent  source,  a 
sum  of  money  about  as  great  as  the  public  appropriation.  Three  hundred 
and  twenty  volumes,  chiefly  theological,  classical,  and  philosophical,  constituted 
the  nucleus  of  what  was  to  become,  if  not  the  largest,  one  of  the  most 
valuable  libraries  in  North  America.  Mr.  Duyckinck  tells  us  how  contri- 
butions flowed  in.  '  The  magistrates  subscribed  liberally ;  and  a  noble  ex- 
hibition of  the  temper  of  the  times  was  witnessed  in  the  number  of  small 
gifts  and  legacies,  of  pieces  of  family  plate,  and,  in  one  instance,  of  the 
bequest  of  a  number  of  sheep.  With  such  precious  stones  were  the  founda- 
tions of  Harvard  laid.  The  time,  place,  and  manner  need  no  eulogy ;  they 
speak  for  themselves.' 

From  that  day  to  this  a  steady  stream  of  gifts  has  been  flowing  from  all 
quarters ;  the  latest,  and  by  no  means  the  least,  being  from  the  illustrious 
and  beloved  statesman  over  whose  ashes  the  tears  of  a  stricken  nation 
nave  so  recently  fallen.  '  I  bequeath,'  said  Charles  Sumner,  in  his  last  will, 
'to  the  library  of  Harvard  College,  my  books  and  autographs,  whether  in 
Washington  or  Boston,  with  the  understanding  that  duplicates  of  works 
already  belonging  to  the  College  library  may  be  sold  or  exchanged  for  its 
benefit.'  He  also  left  a  trust  for  an  annual  prize  for  the  best  dissertation  by 
any  student  of  the  college,  or  any  of  its  schools,  undergraduate  or  graduate, 
on  universal  peace,  and  the  methods  by  which  war  may  be  permanently  sus- 


EARLY  HISTORY  Oh  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  199 

pended.1     Also  a  large  permanent  fund,  the  income  of  which  is  to  je  spent  in 
purchasing  books. 

The  early  colonists  set  a  printing-press  to  work  as  their  indispensable  and 
well-trusted  ally.  The  first  in  the  colony  was  set  up  in  the  president's  house 
when  the  scnool  was  only  thirty-six  months  old.  The  first  publication  was  the 
Freeman's  Oath  ;  the  next  an  Almanac,  and  the  third  The  Bay  Psalm  Book, 
which  was  prepared  by  the  Rev.  Henry  Dunster,  an  excellent  oriental  scholar.8 
He  was  succeeded  by  Charles  Chauncy,  who  held  the  office  till  his  death  in 
1672.  His  old  age  was  distinguished  by  great  vigor  of  mind  and  body,  fairly 
earned  by  hard  work  and  self-denial.  His  first  published  sermon  was  on  '  The 
Advantages  of  Schools  and  a  Faithful  Ministry.' 

In  tracing  the  line  of  worthies  from  Dunster,  the  first,  to  the  vigorous  Eliot, 
the  latest  of  the  Harvard  presidents,  we  feel  as  though  we  were  walking 
through  some  long-drawn  cathedral  aisle,  on  either  side  of  which  lie  the 
sculptured  eulogies  of  the  great  departed.3 

When  Increase  Mather,— one  of  the  mighty  names  of  Old  New  England,— 
was  sent  to  England  to  maintain  the  rights  of  the  colonists  with  James  II., 
and  William  and  Mary,  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  Thomas  Hollis,  a  mer- 
chant of  London,  whom  he  interested  so  deeply  in  the  cause,  that  he  after- 
wards became  a  distinguished  benefactor  of  Harvard.  He  founded  two  pro- 
fessorships, sent  a  set  of  Hebrew  and  Greek  types  for  printing,  with  liberal  sums 
of  money,  books,  and  philosophical  apparatus.  These  bequests  continued 
through  his  descendants,  who  displayed  the  same  liberality.  The  third  Thomas 
Hollis,  after  three  donations  during  his  lifetime,  left  in  his  will  five  hundred 
pounds  sterling,  whose  income  is  appropriated  for  the  purchase  of  books.  One 
of  the  few  early  good  pictures  painted  in  America,  is  the  full-length  portrait  of 
the  first  named  Hollis  by  Copley,  which  hangs  in  the  Memorial  Hall.  These 
Hollises  were  all  men  of  culture  and  broad  spirit.  They  loved  liberty,  and 
helped  it  on  where  it  was  growing  in  England,  and  in  America  where  it  was  be- 
ing planted.  The  last-named  of  the  family  was  instrumental  in  publishing 
the  early  political  essays  of  Mayhew,  Otis,  and  John  Adams,  those  authors  of 
what  we  may  call  the  '  First  Series  of  Liberty  Books  for  Beginners,'  ever 
printed.  They  were  thoroughly  thumbed  by  such  scholars  as  Chatham,  Burke, 
Fox,  Pitt,  Choiseul,  Lafayette ;  and  afterwards  by  the  champions  of  liberty 
throughout  the  world. 

On  a  bitter  cold  night  in  the  winter  of  1764,  Harvard  suffered  her  first  disas- 
ter in  the  loss  of  her  library  by  fire.     The  old  Harvard  Hall  was  destroyed, 

1   '  I  do  this  in  the  hope  of  drawing  the  attention  of  Stephen   Daye,    the  printer,  printed   the  Freeman*  t 

students  to  the  practicability  of  organizing  peace  among  Oa^,  and  an  almanac  calculated  for  New  England; 

nations,  which  I  sincerely  believe  may  be  done.     lean-  and  in  1640,  'for  the  edification   and  comfort  of  the 

not  doubt  that  some  modes  of  decision  which  now  pre-  saints,'  the  Psalms, — faithfully  but  rudely  translated 

vail  between  individuals,  between  towns,  and  between  in  metre  from  the  Hebrew  by  Thomas  Welde  and  John 

smaller  communities  may  be  extended    to   nations. —  Eliot,    ministers    of    Roxbury,    assisted    by   Richard 

Lester's  Lite  and  Public  Services  0/  Charles  Sum-  Mather,   minister  of  Dorchester, — were  published  in  a 

ner,  p.  588.  volume  of  three  hundred  octavo  pages,  the  first  ever 

1  «-r~  ™      !<»►.,  **,.  n^w.  :„  .1.   .  \,       a  printed  in  America,  north  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. — Ban- 

-     J  o  complete  the  colony  in  church  and  common-  J*    f,       .    •     _         '  .  T  _ 

wealth  work,'  Jesse  Glover,  a  worthy  minister,   'able  crott'  vo1,  u»  P-  414"415" 

In  estate,'  and  of  a  liberal  spirit,  in  that  same  year  em-  3  For  a  full  History  of  Harvard  College  the  readet 

barked  for  Boston  with  fonts  of  letters  for  printing,  and  is  referred  to  Quincy's  History  of  Harvard  University. 
I  printer.     He  died    on    the    passage ;    but    in   1639, 


200  GREA  T  MEN  SENT  0  UT  FR OM  HAR  VARD. 

with  some  six  thousand  volumes,  including  the  Oriental  library  bequeathed 
by  Dr.  Lightfoot,  and  the  Greek  and  Roman  classics  presented  by  Berkeley. 
Scholars  have  for  ages  read  with  grief  of  the  destruction  of  the  great  Alexan- 
drian library,  and  vast  the  loss  may  have  been.  There  was,  however,  and 
always  will  be,  a  spice  of  comfort  in  the  thought  that  with  some  grains  of  wheat, 
away  went,  in  a  magnificent  bonfire,  the  folly  and  rubbish  of  a  hundred  gene- 
rations. Probably  there  was  very  little  rubbish  consumed  that  night  when  the 
village  of  Cambridge  was  lit  up  by  this  cruel  conflagration.  Such  men  as  Light- 
foot,  Berkeley,  and  the  other  donors  of  literature,  did  not  deal  very  much  in  rub- 
bish. But  the  phcenix  soon  rose,  new  plumed,  from  its  ashes.  Literary  treasures 
poured  in  from  the  friends  of  learning,  and  the  library  was  soon  richer  than  ever. 

From  this  time  the  prosperity  of  Harvard  College  has  been  uninterrupted. 
It  was  the  earliest,  and  has  been  the  most  richly  endowed  of  all  the  institu- 
tions of  learning  in  America.  Its  history  is  the  history  of  the  progress  of 
American  literature.  It  has  educated  more  teachers  who  became  founders 
of  other  schools  ;  it  has  turned  out  a  greater  number  of  eminent  men  in  every 
department  of  classical  and  scientific  achievement;  it  has  held  steadily  a 
higher  standard  of  scholarship  and  literary  attainment ;  its  scroll  of  gradu- 
ates not  only  far  exceeds  in  number,  but  in  brilliancy,  those  of  any  other 
American  institution.  The  mere  enumeration  of  the  list  of  great  men  that  have 
been  educated  at  Harvard,  and  their  contributions  to  the  intellectual  wealth 
of  the  world,  were  a  hopeless  task,  even  if  I  could  devote  to  it  many  of 
these  broad  pages.  Steadily  from  this  fountain  had  the  invigorating  stream 
been  flowing  for  two  centuries  before  we  reach  such  names  as  Quincy, 
Everett,  Sparks,  Walker,  Hill,,  and  Elliot  among  its  presidents  ;  or  the  Wares, 
the  Woods,  Channing,  Buckminster,  Norton,  Palfrey,  Noyes,  and  Francis, 
in  sacred  literature  ;  or  Felton,  Ticknor,  Follen,  Longfellow,  Lowell,  Emer- 
son, or  Winthrop  ;  Webber,  Bowditch,  Farrar,  Peck,  Cogswell,  Harris,  and 
Wyman  in  mathematics,  natural  history  and  philosophy ;  or  Isaac  Parker 
Parsons,  Stearns,  Story,  Ashmun,  Greenleaf,  William  Kent,  and  Joel  Parkei 
in  jurisprudence.1 

Harvard  has  some  fine  edifices.  Gore  Hall,  the  library  building,  was 
completed  in  1841,  and  named  in  honor  of  Christopher  Gore,  the  statesman, 
who  left  the  college  $100,000.  The  picture  gallery  embraces  few  but  works 
of  merit;  among  our  earlier  painters  the  productions  of  Smibert,  Copley, 
Stuart,  and  Trumbull ;  and  of  the  later,  Newton,  Frothingharn,  and  the  more 
modern  painters.  But  by  far  the  most  imposing  and  splendid  of  its  struc- 
tures has  only  just  been  completed — Memorial  Hall,  which  in  beauty  of  de- 
sign the  appropriateness  of  its  objects,  and  the  tenderness  and  patriotism  of 
sentiment  which  reared  it,  all  combined,  render  it  the  finest  structure  that  has 
yet  gone  up  by  private  munificence  in  our  land. 

1  Mr.  Joseph  Dabney  published  in  the  Am.  Quar.  Ecclesiastical  Statistics,  including  the  Ages  of  840  dc- 

Register,  xiv.  377,  a  list  of  one  hundred  and  eighty-nine  ceased  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  who  were  graduated  a. 

graduates  of  Harvard,  chiefly  clergymen,  who,  up  to  Harvard    College,  from   1642    to   1826.     Of  these   342 

1842,  had  reached  or  passed  the  age  of  eighty-four,  died  at  seventy  and  upwards.  There  were  17  at  ninetj 

Four  graduates  of  Harvard  were  centenarians.      Dr.  and  upwards. 
Farmer,  in  the  same  work  (x.  39),  published  a  series  of 


II ILLIAM  AND  MARY  COLLEGE.  201 

William  and  Mary  College  comes  next  in  order  of  time.  We  have  already 
spoken  of  the  first  effort  at  education  in  Virginia/  In  16 19  Sir  Edmund 
Sandys  received  from  some  unknown  benefactor  five  hundred  pounds,  to  be 
applied  by  the  Virginia  Company  to  the  education  of  Indian  boys  in  the 
English  language  and  the  Christian  religion.  Other  sums  were  given.  The 
king  favored  the  design,  and  at  his  recommendation  the  English  bishops  col- 
lected fifteen  hundred  pounds  for  the  purpose.  The  Company  appropriated 
ten  thousand  acres  of  land  to  aid  it  at  Henrico.  Tenants  at  halves  were 
placed  on  the  soil,  and  the  Rev.  Mr.  Copeland  acted  as  president.  Mr. 
Thorpe,  too,  went  out  in  162 1,  and  everything  was  promising  fair  for  this  first 
attempt  at  knowledge  in  our  own  land.  But  the  officers  and  tenants,  and 
even  the  students  themselves,  were  slain  in  the  great  massacre  of  1622,  and 
the  whole  enterprise  whelmed  in  ruin. 

In  1660-6  [,  the  General  Assembly  of  the  Colony  of  Virginia,  took  active 
steps  towards  again  founding  a  college,  by  appropriating  money,  ordering 
and  legalizing  subscriptions,  and  directing  land  to  be  purchased,  and  buildings 
erected.  An  act  was  passed  at  its  Session  of  1660-61,  and  renewed  the 
following  Session,  for  the  execution  of  this  project.  But  little  is  known  of  the 
result  of  this  attempt.  Doubtless  it  had  some  success,  and  was  the  true 
germ  of  the  College  of  William  and  Mary.  That  so  little  is  known  of  it 
maybe  attributed,  partly,  to  the  troubles  in  the  colony  culminating  in  Bacon's 
Rebellion,  and  partly,  to  Sir  William  Berkeley's  arbitrary  rule. 

The  prospect  for  the  future,  also,  was  dark  enough  for  a  long  time ;  for, 
as  late  as  1671,  in  his  'Answers  to  Questions  put  by  the  Lords  of  Planta- 
tions,' Governor  Sir  William  Berkeley  ■  thanks  God  that  there  are  no  free 
schools  nor  printing  in  the  colony,  and  hopes  there  will  not  be  these  hundred 
years  ;  for  learning  has  brought  disobedience,  and  heresy,  and  sects,  into  the 
world,  and  printing  has  divulged  them,  and  libels  against  the  best  government. 
God  keep  us  from  both  ! '  That  prayer  came  pretty  near  being  answered ; 
for  150  years  later,  a  Virginia  member  of  Congress  thanked  God  that  his 
district  was  without  a  newspaper. 

In  1693,  however,  through  the  agency  of  Rev.  James  Blair,  a  learned 
.  Scotch  preacher,  who  was  persuaded  by  the  Bishop  of  London  to  emigrate  to 
Virginia  towards  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Charles  II.,  and  by  the  assistance 
of  Nicholson,  Lieutenant-Governor  of  the  colony,  a  charter  was  obtained 
from  the  government  of  England,  and  the  new  college  took  its  name  from  the 
royal  grantors,  who  appropriated  money,  lands,  and  a  revenue  duty  on  to- 
bacco for  its  support.  Buildings  were  erected,  and  Blair  became  president. 
A  thousand  pounds  were  granted  to  the  college,  and  already  in  1691,  from 
the  estate  of  Robert  Boyle,  the  philosopher,  an  income  was  secured  to  the 
college  on  condition  of  supporting  one  Indian  scholar  for  every  fourteen 
pounds  received.  A  not  very  successful  effort  to  carry  out  the  will  of  the 
donor  was  made  for  many  years.  In  1728  Col.  Wm.  Byrd  laments  the  'bad 
success  Mr.  Loyle's  charity  has  hitherto  had  towards  converting  any  of  these 
poor  heathens  to  Christianity.     Many  children  of  our  neighboring  Indians 


202  ITS  STRUGGLES  AND  TRIUMPHS. 

have  been  brought  up  in  the  college  of  William  and  Mary.  They  have 
been  taught  to  read  and  write,  and  have  been  carefully  instructed  in  the 
principles  of  the  Christian  religion  till  they  came  to  be  men,  yet  after  they 
returned  home,  instead  of  civilizing  and  converting  the  rest,  they  have  imme- 
diately relapsed  into  infidelity  and  barbarism  themselves.'  Mr.  Duyckinck 
adds  :  '  The  old  story  of  the  fading  race,  and  pretty  much  the  same,  whether 
'elated  by  South  American  Jesuits,  Virginia  cavaliers,  or  New  England 
zealots.'  Philip  Freneau  has  pointed  the  moral  in  his  poem  of  the  Indian 
Student  who  ■  laid  his  Virgil  by  to  wander  with  his  dearer  bow.'  « Though 
little  good  may  have  been  done  directly  to  the  Indians,  the  scheme  may  have 
brought  to  them  incidental  benefits.  The  instruction  of  the  Indian  was  the 
romance  of  educational  effort,  and  acted  in  enlisting  benefactors  much  as 
favorite  but  impracticable  foreign  missions  have  done  at  a  later  day.  It  was 
a  plan  of  kindred  character  with  those  in  Virginia  which  first  engaged  the 
benevolent  Berkeley  in  his  eminent  services  to  the  American  colleges.  One 
of  these  institutions,  Dartmouth,  grew  out  of  such  a  foundation.' 

On  the  breaking  out  of  the  Revolution  one-half  of  the  students,  among 
whom  was  James  Monroe,  entered  the  army.  'The  French  troops  occupied 
the  college  buildings,  or  a  part  of  them.  After  the  surrender  of  Lord  Corn- 
wallis,  and  while  they  had  possession,  the  president's  house  was  burned.  The 
French  Government  promptly  paid  for  rebuilding  it.  The  college  building 
was  occupied  as  a  hospital  at  the  same  time,  and  much  damaged  and  broken 
up  ;  but  the  United  States  Government  has  never  made  any  remuneration.' 

1  As  the  second  oldest  collegiate  institution  in  the  United  States,  William 
and  Mary  College  has  been  well  claimed  by  President  Ewell  to  hold  the 
same  rank  to  the  South,  as  an  educator  of  our  eminent  national  men,  that 
Harvard  and  Yale  do  to  the  North.  It  instructed  Peyton  Randolph,  Presi- 
dent of  the  first  Continental  Congress,  Thomas  Jefferson,  author  of  the  im- 
mortal Declaration  of  Independence,  and  four  more  of  its  signers — Benjamin 
Harrison,  Carter  Braxton,  Thomas  Nelson,  and  George  Wythe.  Among 
others  of  its  alumni  were  James  Monroe,  John  Tyler,  Chief  Justice  Marshall, 
Judge  Bushrod  Washington,  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke,  Winfield  Scott,  John 
J.  Crittenden,  and  William  C.  Rives.  It  gave  George  Washington  his  com- 
mission as  surveyor,  and  made  him  its  chancellor  for  the  last  ten  years  of  his 
life.' 

It  has  had  to  buffet  with  repeated  vicissitudes  of  fortune.  Priv. ;  to  the 
Revolution,  it  was  the  richest  college  in  America  ;  but  that  trouble  cut  off 
its  best  endowments.  On  the  night  of  the  8th  of  February,  1859,  when  the 
alumni  were  on  the  eve  of  celebrating  its  166th  anniversary,  its  building  was 
destroyed  by  an  accidental  fire,  with  its  library  of  rare  books  and  manuscripts, 
and  most  of  its  interesting  antiquities.  A  new  edifice  rose  to  its  completion 
within  a  year,  and  was  promptly  refurnished  by  ample  donations,  so  that  at 
ihe  start  a  library  was  mustered  of  6,000  volumes.  Three  years  later,  while 
General  McClellan's  army  held  the  peninsula,  during  his  advance  on  Rich- 
mond, the  new  building  was  wantonly  fired  by  drunken  stragglers,  and  was 


NATIONAL  INJUSTICE  TOWARDS  WILLIAM  AND  MARY.    203 


consumed  with  all  its  apparatus,  September  9th,  I862.1  After  an  interregnum 
of  five  years,  William  and  Mary  resumed  its  Academic  Department  and  Pre- 
paratory School  in  1865.  Although  seriously  crippled  by  the  ravages  of  war, 
it  has  since  given  gratuitous  instruction  to  over  two  hundred  scholars.  Its 
main  building  was  substantially  restored  in  July,  1869.  A  full  faculty  was 
engaged,  with  President  Benjamin  S.  Ewell,  a  gentleman  of  mature  learning 
and  untiring  energy  at  its  head  ;  and  a  revised  course  of  studies  inaugurated. 
When  the  nation  pays  the  great  debt  which  she  owes  to  William  and  Mary, 
this  venerable  school  of  learning  will  once  more  shine  with  its  original  lustre. 


1  Last  spring  (1874)  a  '  Petition  was  presented  by 
the  College  for  an  Appropriation  by  Congress  on  account 
ot  Revolutionary  Losses,  and  because  of  the  Destruc- 
tion of  its  Buildings  and  other  Property  by  the  United 
States  troops  during  the  late  Civil  War.'  It  was 
ably  supported  by  President  Ewell  before  the  Com- 
mittee of  Education  and  Labor,  of  the  House  of  Rep- 
resentatives. I  would  gladly  give  place  to  his  entire 
argument,  for  it  is  one  of  the  most  touching,  noble,  and 
just  appeals  in  behalf  of  the  injured  cause  of  educa- 
tion ever  pronounced.  Its  eloquent  utterances  will  be 
heeded  at  no  distant  day  when  an  American  Congress 
shall  assemble  which  shall  represent,  if  not  the  magna- 
nimity which  always  inspires  the  generous  conqueror, 
at  least  the  sense  ot  justice  which  lives  in  the  breasts 
of  the  true-hearted  people  of  the  North. 

After  a  lucid  historical  sketch  of  the  history  of  the 
College  down  to  1776,  when  it  appears  to  have  been  the 
richest  institution  of  learning  in  the  country.  President 
Ewell  recounts  the  losses  of  its  chartered  and  other 
endowments,  and  fairly  bases  the  claim  for  remunera- 
tion for  the  rent  of  the  main  structure  and  out-buildings 
used  for  hospital  purposes,  from  1776  till  1781  when 
they  were  destroyed.  He  quotes  precedents  in  justi- 
fication of  the  claim  which  had  been  earnestly  pressed 
in  the  Senate  in  1855.  Like  claims  had  been  paid  to 
Rhode  Island  College  for  rent  from  1776  to  1780,  and 
damage  to  the  building  ;  to  the  proprietor  of  Pennsylva- 
nia hospital,  and  others.  Rev.  Dr.  Witherspoon  was 
charged  with  $19,040  in  1779  on  the  books  of  the  Quar- 
termaster's Department  for  repairs  of  Princeton  College, 
and  on  these  claims  Alexander  Hamilton,  then  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury,  said,  '  It  appears  to  me  most  consistent 
with  the  justice  and  liberality  of  the  Government  to 
authorize  the  allowance  of  reasonable  compensation  in 
all  cases  in  which  any  place  of  religious  worship,  or  any 
seminary  of  learning  has  been  occupied  or  injured  by 
the  troops  of  the  United  States,  the  act  of  limitation  to 
the  contrary  notwithstanding.' 

General  McComb  paid  to  the  University  of  Vermont 
$5,000  a  year  rent  during  the  War  of  1812. 

In  writing  on  this  subject  to  the  officers  of '  the  Uni- 
versity of  William  and  Mary,'  Oct  27,  1781,  Gen. 
Washington  said  : 

'The  seat  of  literature  at  Williamsburg  has  ever,  in 
my  view,  been  an  object  of  veneration.  As  an  institu- 
tion important  for  its  communication  of  useful  learning, 
and  conducive  to  the  true  principles  of  national  liberty, 
you  may  be  assured  that  it  shall  receive  every  encour- 
agement and  benefaction  in  my  power  toward  its  re- 
establishment.  The  sick  and  wounded  of  the  army, 
whom  my  necessities  have  compelled  me  to  trouble  you 
with,  shall  be  removed  as  soon  as  circumstances  will 
permit — an  event  which  will  be  as  pleasing  to  me  as 
agreeable  to  you.' 

General  Meade,  that  truly  brave  and  just  man, 
thus  writes  concerning  the  destruction  of  the  College 
buildings  while  held  by  the  Federal  troops  during  the 
Civil  War : 

'I  am  satisfied,  on  examination  of  the  facts  of  the 
case,  that  the  destruction  of  the  buildings  of  William 
and  Mary  College  by  our  troops,  was  not  only  unneces- 
*ary  and  unauthorized,  but  was  one  of  those  deplorable 
•cts  of  useless  destruction  which  occur  in  all  wars. 

1  In  this  view,  and  believing  that  its  reconstruction 
will  tend  to  cement  and  strengthen  the  bonds  of  union, 
&nd  to  give  encouragement  to  the  growth  and  spread- 
ing of  Unior  principles,   I  take  great  pleasure  in  re- 


commending the  appeal  of  Professor  Ewell  to  all  those 
who  have  the  means  and  the  disposition  to  assist  him 
in  the  good  work  in  which  he  is  engaged.' 

The  best  words  perhaps  uttered  in  the  debate  on 
the  Petition,  fell  from  the  lips  of  one  of  Massachusetts 
noblest  Representatives,  and  they  came  with  the  more 
grace  from  the  State  which  held  the  venerable  university 
of  Harvard,  which  had  for  generations  enjoyed  the 
Boyle  benefice  through  the  faithful  hands  of  Williams 
and  Mary. 

Hon.  Geo.  F.  Hoar  said  ; 

'To  spare,  and  if  possible  to  protect,  institutions  of 
learning,  is  an  obligation  which  the  most  civilized  na- 
tions impose  on  themselves.  Whenever,  by  accident 
or  design,  these  institutions  have  been  injured  in  war, 
such  governments  desire,  if  possible,  to  make  repara- 
tion. History  contains  many  conspicuous  and  interest- 
ing examples  of  this  generous  recognition  ....  In 
her  bloodiest  and  angriest  civil  strifes,  all  factions  in 
England  have  revered  her  institutions  of  learning.  Her 
schools  and  colleges,  whatever  side  they  may  have 
taken  in  civil  war,  have  enjoyed  immunity  from  its 
injuries,  when  even  her  stately  and  venerable  cathe- 
drals have  not  been  spared.  Think  what  permanence 
these  schools  enjoy,  shielded  from  the  storms  of  war 
by  the  beneficent  principle  we  invoke.  Wherever  civi- 
lization exists,  wherever  men  are  humane  and  Christian, 
the  College  or  the  school,  wisely  founded,  shall  endure. 
I  purchased  at  Eton,  a  few  years  since,  a  little  book 
containing  the  history  of  the  ten  great  schools  of  Eng- 
land. I  was  struck,  in  looking  over  it.  to  see  dates  of 
their  endowment :  Eton,  in  1440 ;  Winchester,  1380  ; 
Westminster,  1560;  St.  Paul's,  1509;  Merchant  Tay- 
lor's, 1560;  Charter  House,  1611 ;  Harrow,  1571  ; 
Rugby,  1567 ;  Shrewsburry,  1549 ;  Christ's,  1552 ; 
while  the  origin  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge  is  lost  in  the 
darkness  of  antiquity. 

'  These  schools  have  survived  all  the  changes  of 
dynasty,  all  the  changes  of  institutions  and  manners  ; 
Puritan  and  Cavalier,  York  and  Lancaster  have  fought 
out  their  battles,  and  yet,  in  the  wildest  tempests  of 
popular  exchement,  they 

Lift  not  their  spears  against  the  "Muses'  bower. 

*  At.  Winchester  William  of  Wykeham  founded,  in 
1380,  a  school  which  still  stands  and  has  remained 
through  four  dynasties.  Guelph,  Hanover,  Tudor,  York, 
Lancaster  and  Plantagenet,  have  successively  struggled 
for  and  occupied  the  English  throne,  while  in  the  build- 
ing, which  Wykeham  in  his  lifetime  planned  and  built, 
the  scholars  of  Winchester  are  still  governed  by  the 
statutes  which  he  framed. 

'You  will  scarcely  find  an  instance,  in  England  or 
America,  where  a  school  or  college,  wisely  founded, 
has  died.     "  Whatever  perishes,  that  shall  endure."  . 

'  But  William  and  Mary  has  also  her  own  peculiar 
claim  on  our  regard.  The  great  principles  on  which 
the  rights  of  man  depend,  which  inspired  the  statesmen 
of  Virginia  of  the  period  of  the  Revolution,  are  the 
fruits  of  her  teaching.  The  name  of  Washington,  to 
whose  genius  in  war,  and  to  whose  influence  in  peace 
we  owe  the  vindication  of  our  liberties  and  the  success- 
ful inauguration  of  our  Constitution,  is  inseparably  con- 
nected with  William  and  Mary.  She  gave  him  his 
first  commission  in  his  youth  ;  he  gave  to  her  his  last 
public  service  in  his  age.  Jefferson,  author  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,"  who  announced  the  great 
law  of  equality  and  human  rights,  in  whose  light  our 
Constituuon  is  at  last  and  forever  to  be  interpreted, 


204  YALE  COLLEGE. 

Yale  College. — We  now  reach  the  first  year  of  the  last  century,  when  Yale 
College  was  founded.  Up  to  that  time  various  proposals  had  been  made, 
beginning  as  early  as  1647,  for  the  establishment  of  a  college  in  the  colony 
of  New  Haven  j  but  chiefly  in  deference  to  Harvard,  which  had  been  the 
pioneer,  no  central  classical  school  was  set  up,  and  the  young  men  of  New 
Haven  colony,  after  leaving  their  home  classical  schools,  for  a  long  time 
looked  to  Cambridge  for  the  completion  of  their  studies.  But  in  the  year 
1700  a  College  Association  was  formed  consisting  of  eleven  members,  all 
clergymen,  living  in  the  colony.  Their  first  meeting  was  at  New  Haven. 
Shortly  after,  they  met  at  Branford,  each  bringing  as  many  volumes  as  he 
could  collect,  and  laid  them  on  the  table  with  the  declaration,  '  I  give  these 
books  for  founding  a  college  in  this  colony.'  The  General  Court  granted  a 
charter  the  following  year,  the  declared  object  being  ' to  instruct  youth  in 
the  arts  and  sciences  who  may  be  fitted  for  public  employment  both  in  Church 
and  Civil  State."  ■ 

The  first  rector  of  the  college  was  Abraham  Pierson,  who  taught  the 
students  in  his  house  at  Killingworth.  He  was  a  graduate  of  Harvard,  and 
with  several  advanced  scholars,  held  his  first  commencement  at  Saybrook  in 
1 702.  As  the  school  grew  from  these  small  beginnings,  Hartford  contended 
with  New  Haven  for  the  honor  of  the  seat  of  the  college.  It  was  at  last 
determined  in  favor  of  the  latter  place,  and  there  the  commencement  of  171 7 
was  held.  It  was  named  after  its  first  great  patron.  Elihu  Yale,  though 
born  in  the  place,  had  wandered  far  from  it  in  his  boyhood,  and  in  the  East 
Indies  reached  rank  and  fortune,  and  finally  made  his  home  in  London. 
He  did  not  forget  his  birthplace,  but  sent  liberal  contributions  of  books  and 
merchandise  to  the  college.  The  trustees  named  their  institution  Yale  Col- 
lege.     To  another  man   the   library  owed   generous   donations — Jeremiah 

drank  his  inspiration  at  her  fountain.     Marshall,  with-  delphia  from  Cooke,  and  William  and   Mary  herself 

out  whose  luminous  and  farsighted  exposition  our  Con-  from   Louis  XVI.  of  France.     The  hallowed  associa- 

stitution  could  hardly  have  been  put  into  successful  and  tions   which  surround  this   College  prevent   this  case 

harmonious  operation,  who  embedded   forever  in  our  from  being  a  precedent  for  any  other.      If   you  had 

constitutional   law   the  great  doctrines  on   which  the  injured  it,  you  surely  would  have  restored  Mount  Ver- 

measures  that  saved  the  Union  are  based,  was  a  son  of  non  ;  you  had  better  honor  Washington,  by  restoring 

William  and  Mary.     By  the  cession  of  the  great  North-  the  living  fountain  of  learning,  whose  service  was  the 

western  territory,  largely  due  to  the  efforts  of  one  of  her  pleasure  of  his  last  years,  than  by  any  useless  and  empty 

illustrious  sons,  she  lost  a  great  part  of  her  revenues.  act  of  worship  or  respect  towards  his  sepulchre. 

'  Next  to  Harvard  she  is  the  oldest  of  American  Col-  4  No  other  College  in   the  country  can  occupy  th« 

leges.     The  gift  of  the  famous  Robert  Boyle  was  held  same  position.     By  the  fortune  of  war  that  sacred  in- 

by  her  for  many  years,  on  condition  of  an  annual  pay-  stitution,  which  has  conferred  on  the  country  a  hundred- 

ment  of  £qo   to   Harvard.     Boyle  was   the  friend  of  fold  more  benefit  than  any  other  institution  or  College 

many  of  the  early  friends  and  benefactors  of  Harvard,  in  the  South,  has  become  a  sufferer.     I  desire  to  hold 

and   a  correspondent  of  one   &£  its  first  Presidents,  out  the  olive  branch  to  the  people  of  Virginia,  to  the 

Each  of  these  two  seminaries,  in  its  own  part  of  the  people  of  the  South,  to  show  them  that  we  will  join  them 

country,   kindled   and   kept  alive   the   sacred   fire  of  in  rebuilding  the  sacred  place  laid  waste  by  the  fortunes 

liberty.     In  1743,  the  year  Jefferson  was  born,  Samuel  of  war.' 

Adams  maintained,  on  taking  his  degree  of  Master  of  If  claims  like  these,  enforced  by  such  eloquence, 
Arts  at  Harvard,  the  affirmative  of  the  thesis,  whether  were  unheeded  by  the  men  who  were  styled  '  the  Re- 
it  be  lawful  to  resist  the  Supreme  Magistrate,  if  the  presentatives  of  the  American  People,'  some  of  us  will 
Commonwealth  cannot  otherwise  be  preserved?  In  live  to  thank  their  successors  for  justice  crowned  with 
this  hour  of  the  calamity  of  her  sister  College  I  am  a  generosity  which  will  have  atoned  for  the  delay  ! 
glad  to  believe  that  Harvard  does  not  forget  the  an- 
cient tie.  The  mother  of  the  Otises  and  Adamses  *  The  names  of  these  eleven  founders  were  James 
would  gladly  extend  her  right  hand  to  the  mother  of  Noyes,  of  Stonington  ;  Israel  Chauncy,  of  Stratford  ; 
Jefferson  and  Marshall. _  Thomas  Buckingham,  of  Saybrook;    Abraham  Pier- 

'  If  civil  strife  or  foreign  war  shall  ever  again  disturb  son,  of  Killingworth  ;    Samuel  Mather,   of  Windsor  ; 

our  peace,  every  College  in  the  land  will  be  safer  if  Samuel  Andrew,  of  Milford  ;  Timothy  Woodbridge,  of 

Congress  shall  to-day  make  this  solemn  recognition  of  Hartford  ;  James  Pierpont,  of  New  Haven  ;  Noadiah 

the  rule  we  invoke.     To  deny  it  is  to  deny  to  the  Col-  Russell,  of  Middletown  ;  Joseph  Webb,  of  Fairfield, 

lege  of  Washington  the  justice  he   did  to  Princeton.  To  these  Samuel  Russell,  of  Branford,  was  afterward* 

To  deny  it  is  to  deny  to  Virginia  the  generous  treat-  added. 
Bient  which  Connecticut  receiveu  from  Tryon,  Phila- 


EARLY  HISTORY  OF  YALE  COLLEGE.  205 

Dummer,  of  Boston,  who  acted  as  agent  of  Massachusetts  in  England.  He 
told  some  of  his  illustrious  friends  about  the  young  college, — among  them 
Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Sir  Richard  Steele,  Burnet,  Woodward,  Halley,  Bentley, 
Rennet,  Calamy,  Edwards,  and  Whiston,  all  of  whom  presented  their  writings. 

During  the  presidency  of  the  Rev.  Elisha  Williams,  which  lasted  till  1739, 
Bishop  Berkeley  '"took  the  college  under  his  special  favor,  and  made  his  cele- 
brated donations.  While  staying  at  Newport  he  became  acquainted  with 
some  of  the  friends  of  the  institution,  and  on  his  return  to  England  in  1732, 
the  year  of  Washington's  birth,  deeded  to  the  college  his  house  and  farm  at 
Newport,  the  income  to  be  devoted  to  aiding  the  three  best  scholars  in  Latin 
and  Greek,  and  the  purchase  of  books  in  those  languages,  as  prizes  to  under- 
graduates. 

From  Professor  Kingsley's  ■  Sketch  of  Yale  College,'  we  find  among  the 
successful  applicants  for  the '  Dean's  bounty,'  the  names  of  Dr.  Wheelock,  first 
president  of  Dartmouth,  Rev.  Aaron  Burr,  president  of  the  College  of  New 
Jersey,  Presidents  Daggett  and  Dwight,  the  Rev.  Joseph  Buckminster,  with 
other  eminent  men.  The  collection  which  Berkeley  presented  to  the  college 
was  very  choice,  and  numbered  nearly  a  thousand  volumes. 

The  first  professorship  of  theology,  which  was  the  fruit  of  Whitefield's 
preaching,  borrowed  its  name  from  its  first  contributor,  the  honorable  Philip 
Livingston  of  New  York.  When  the  British  took  possession  of  New  Haven 
in  1779,  President  Daggett  was  taken  prisoner,  found  wounded,  but  with  a 
musket  in  his  hand,  bravely  resisting  the  foe.  In  his  history  of  Yale  College, 
Baldwin  tells  us  that  '  he  was  unhandsomely  treated  with  violence  and  per- 
sonal injury  by  his  captors.'  His  presidency  was  successful,  numbering  among 
his  scholars,  Trumbull,  Dwight,  Humphreys,  and  Barlow. 

Some  of  the  ripest  scholars  and  the  best  men  of  America  have  presided 
over  Yale  College,  or  become  distinguished  as  professors.  Dr.  Ezra  Stiles, 
Timothy  Dwight,  Jeremiah  Day,  Theodore  Dwight  Woolsey,  Kingsley,  Silli- 
man,  Goodrich,  Olmsted,  Taylor,  Fitch,  Justice  Bissell,  and  Governor  Dutton, 
are  but  a  few  on  the  shining  scroll,  while  its  thousands  of  graduates  have  shed 


1  '  The  arrival  in  America  of  the  Rev.  Mr.  George  and  France.     By  the  friendship  of  the  Duke  of  Grafton 

Berkeley,  then   Dean  of  Deny,  afterwards  Bishop  of  he  received  his  appointment  as  Dean  of  Deny  ;  and 

Cloyne,'  says  Samuel  Miller,  in  his  Retrospect  of  the  the  death  of  Swift's  Vanessa,  who  made  him  one  of  her 

Eighteenth  Century,  '  deserves  to  be  noticed  in  the  lit-  legatees,  further  added  to  his  resources.     With  all  this 

erary  history  of  America,  not  only  as   a  remarkable  good  fortune  at  hand,  his  benevolent  enthusiasm  led 

event,  but  also  as  one  which  had  some  influence  on  the  him  to   engage  in  the  distant  and  uncertain  project  of 

progress  of  literature,  particularly  in  Rhode  Island  and  erecting  a  college  in  the  Bermudas,  for  converting  the 

Connecticut.'  American  Indians  to  Christianity.     He  wrote  out  his 

'  Berkeley  was  to  the  country  not  only  a  personal  Proposal,  and  his  friend  Swift  gave  him  a  letter  to  Lord 

friend  and  benefactor,    through    the   genial   example  Carteret  to  second  the  affair,  with  a  humorous  account 

of  his  scholar's  life  and  conversation,"  and   the  gifts  of  the  amiable  projector.     '  He  is  an  absolute  philoso- 

which  he  direcdy  made,  but  he  brought  with  him  the  pher  with  regard  to  money,  titles,  and  power ;  and  for 

prestige  which  attached  to  high  literary  reputation,  and  three  years  past  hath  been  struck  with  a  notion  of  found- 

was  a  connecting  link  to  America  with  what  is  called  ing  a  university  at    Bermuda,  by  a  charter  from    the 

the  Augustan  age  of  Queen  Anne.     Born  in  Ireland,  crown.    He  showed  me  a  little  tract  which  he  designs  to 

March  12,  1684,  and  educated  at  Trinity  College,  Dub-  publish,  and   there  your  Excellency  will  see  his  whole 

lin,  he  had  acquired   distinction  in  mathematics   and  scheme  of  a  life  academico-philosophical  of  a  college 

philosophy,  and  before  the  age  of  thirty  had  vented  his  founded  for  Indian  schools  and  missionaries,  where  he 

celebrated  ideal  theory  in  print.   He  was  introduced  by  most  exorbitantly  proposeth  a  whole  hundred  pounds 

Steele  and  Swift  to  the  circle  of  London  wits,  who  ad-  a  year  for  himself,  forty  pounds  for  a  fellow,  and  ten  for 

mired   the  man,  while  they  jested  at  his  immaterial  a  student.     His  heart  will  break  if  his  deanery  be  no! 

philosophy.     To  the  fine  speculations  of  the  scholar,  he  taken  from  him  and  left  to  your  Excellency's  disposaL 

had  added  a  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  the  liberal  — Duyckinck's  Cyclopadia,  p.  175. 
associations  of  travel  through  his    residence  in  Italy 


206  ITS  GREAT  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  LEARNING. 

lustre  over  innumerable  scenes  of  achievement  in  every  department  of  human 
effort. 

The  names  of  the  benefactors  of  the  college  would  make  a  golden  book,  and 
all  the  more  glory  to  them,  since  for  the  most  part  they  were  only  men  of  learn- 
ing and  not  of  fortune.  Oliver  Woolcot  gave  $2,000  to  the  library,  and  Eli 
Whitney,  the  inventor  of  the  cotton-gin,  and  graduate  of  the  college,  founded 
a  fund  for  the  purchase  of  books  on  mechanical  and  physical  science.  Dr 
Perkins,  another  graduate,  gave  to  the  permanent  library  fund  $10,000.  Prof 
Morse,  the  great  electrician,  contributed  a  valuable  collection  of  books  in 
1823,  and  Dr.  Isaac  Watts,  the  lyric  poet  of  England,  sent  a  pair  of  globes 
Professor  Philo,  of  Halle,  gave  his  library  of  four  thousand  volumes.  Rev. 
W.  F.  Williams,  American  missionary  at  Mosul,  sent  four  of  the  original 
sculptures  of  Nineveh,  while  the  Trumbull  gallery,  the  gift  of  the  artist,  the 
soldier,  and  the  patriot,  is  reckoned  among  the  few  early  and  attractive  col 
lections  of  art  in  possession  of  our  institutions  of  learning. 

The  growth  of  Yale  College  during  the  last  twenty  years  has  been  very 
great.  Upwards  of  ten  thousand  five  hundred  persons  have  since  its  founda- 
tion been  admitted  to  degree,  more  than  two  thousand  of  whom  have  been 
ministers  of  the  gospel ;  while  the  number  of  students  now  engaged  in  the 
various  departments  reaches  nearly  one  thousand,  under  fifty  professors.  The 
recent  donations  to  the  college  have  been  munificent.  The  most  import- 
ant endowment  of  all,  has  perhaps  been  the  Sheffield  Scientific  School,  which 
gave  a  new  and  electrical  impulse  to  the  study  of  the  natural  sciences  through- 
out the  country.  In  1866,  Mr.  George  Peabody  gave  $150,000  to  found  a 
Museum  of  Natural  History,  and  the  contributions  to  its  scientific  collections 
made  by  the  Yale  expedition  among  the  Western  Mountains,  on  the  Pacific 
slope,  under  Prof.  Marsh,  are  not  only  the  most  valuable  in  the  country,  but 
among  the  rarest  in  the  world.  Mr.  Joseph  E.  Sheffield  has  contributed  to 
the  Scientific  School  nearly  half  a  million  dollars ;  while  Mr.  Augustus  S. 
Street,  in  1866,  established  a  School  of  the  Fine  Arts  on  a  firm  basis,  having 
in  all  contributed  to  the  college  $280,000.  The  president,  Noah  Porter,  one 
of  the  ablest  modern  writers  on  psychology,  has  also,  like  President  Eliot,  of 
Harvard,  and  Dr.  McCosh,  of  Princeton,  displayed  great  financial  ability  in 
strengthening  the  sinews  of  their  institutions.  They  have  infused  a  broader 
and  more  heroic  spirit  of  giving  to  the  cause  of  science  and  learning  than  has 
ever  been  awakened  in  any  other  country.1 

The  College  of  New  Jersey.— This  college,  which  has  filled  a  large  sphere, 
especially  in  the  education  of  the  ministers  of  the  Presbyterian  Church,  re- 
ceived its  first  charter  in  1746.  During  the  great  Revival  of  1741,  under  the 
preacKmg  of  Edwards  and  Whitefield,  a  new  interest  was  excited  in  the  pre- 
paration of  young  men  for  the  ministry,  and  the  leading  ministers  of  the 
Presbytery  of  New  York,  mainly  residents  of  East  Jersey,  determined  to  estab- 

>  One  of  the  latest  munificent  gifts  has  been  made    culture  of  New   York.      It   was  for  building  a   aew 
by  Mr.  Joseph  Kattell,  a  merchant  of  high  intellectual    chapei. 


THE  COLLEGE  OF  NEW  JERSEY.  207 

lish  a  seat  of  learning  in  the  State  to  which  they  belonged.  The  Rev.  William 
Tennent  had  for  many  years  maintained  a  classical  and  theological,  school  at 
Neshaminy,  known  as  the  Log  College,  which  had  already  sent  forth  from  its 
humble  doorway  several  eminent  divines  and  preachers.1 

The  first  college  building  was  erected  in  1756,  chiefly  from  contributions 
made  in  England  through  President  Samuel  Davies,  and  the  Rev.  Gilbert 
Tennent,  whose  celebrity  was  greatly  increased  by  his  zeal  as  a  follower  of 
Whitefield.  It  was  proposed  to  name  the  building  Belcher  Hall;  but  the 
modesty  of  the  Governor  substituted  the  name  of  Nassau  Hall,  in  honor  of  the 
great  Protestant  hero,  William  III.  In  the  manuscript  centennial  discourse 
of  Dr.  James  W.  Alexander,  delivered  at  Princeton  in  1846,  he  said  that  this 
college  structure  was  the  best  in  its  time,  and  the  largest  single  edifice  in  the 
Colonies.  Jonathan  Edwards  was  succeeded  in  the  presidency  by  the  Rev. 
Samuel  Davies,  an  eloquent  preacher,  who  was  called  from  Virginia  to  the 
presidency,  which  he  filled  only  a  year  and  a  half,  when  he  sunk  to  an  hon- 
ored grave  at  the  early  age  of  thirty-six.  In  one  of  his  stirring  discourses,  in 
August,  1755,  on  the  expedition  of  Braddock,  entitled  '  Religion  and  Patriot- 
ism the  Constituents  of  a  Good  Soldier,'  he  prophetically  points  out  to  the 
public  '  that  heroic  young  colonel,  Washington,  whom  I  cannot  but  hope 
Providence  has  hitherto  preserved  in  so  signal  a  manner  for  some  impor- 
tant service  to  his  country.'  Davies  was  a  brilliant  representative  of  that 
class  of  learned  young  clergymen,  whose  eloquence  fired  the  patriotism  of  the 
Colonies  when  they  united  with  the  mother  country  in  sweeping  the  French 
power  out  of  North  America.  In  May,  1759,  ne  delivered  before  the  militia 
of  Hanover  County  so  powerful  a  discourse  that  he  at  once  filled  their  ranks. 
The  Rev.  Samuel  Finley  succeeded  to  the  presidency  on  the  death  of  Davies 
in  1 761,  and  his  great  and  useful  labors  were  prolonged  till  his  death,  which 
took  place  in  1776,  when  Dr.  Witherspoon  was  invited  to  come  from  Scotland 
to  fill  his  place.  During  the  Revolution  this  great  man,  without  resigning 
his  trust,  was  elected  to  Congress,  where  he  impressed  his  thoughts  and  spirit 
deeply  upon  that  body,  and  through  them  upon  the  nation.8 

1  In  Dr.  Archibald  Alexander's  history  of  this  school  and  acuteness  with  animated  panegyric. — Duyckinck's 

we  learn  that  Whitefield  visited  it  in  1739,  and  speaks  Cycloj>cedia,  pp.  280-81. 

of  it  as  '  the  place  wherein  young  men  study  in  the  2  Immediately  after  the  battle  of  Princeton  in  1777, 
attempt  called  a  college.'  It  was  a  mournful,  back-  the  vicinity  of  the  college  became  the  scene  of  a  con- 
country  structure  of  the  log-cabin  order.  flict  between  its  British  occupants  and  a  portion  of  the 

Jonathan  Dickinson,  a  learned  divine,  who  settled  army  of  Washington.      In  the  chapel  in  Nassau  Hall 

as  a  clergyman  at  Elizabeth  town,  acted  as  the  first  pre-  hung  at  that  time  a  portrait  of  George  II.,  which  was 

sident  for  a  year,  and  was   succeeded  at  his  death,  destroyed  by  an  American  cannon-shot  passing  through 

(when  a  new  charter  was  obtained  from  Governor  Belch-  the  canvas.      Within    the  same  frame   now  hangs  a 

er),  by  the  Rev.  Aaron   Burr,   the  intimate  friend  of  portrait  of  Washington,  painted  by  Peale.     Being  in- 

Whitefield,  the  son-in-law  of  Jonathan   Edwards,  and  vited  by  the  trustees  of  the  College  some  years  after  the 

the  father  of  Aaron  Burr,  subsequently  Vice-President  battle,  to  sit  for  his  portrait,   he  paid  the  artist  fifty 

of  the  United  States.     On  the  death  of  President  Burr,  guineas  for  the  work,  being  unwilling  that  any  portion 

in  1756,  the  institution  was  removed  from  Newark  to  of  so  small  and  so  sacred  a  fund  should  bear  such  a 

Princeton,  where  he  was  succeeded  by  his  father-in-  burden.     The  College  Library  suffered  loss  from  both 

law,  the  illustrious  author  and  divine.      Burr  was  a  parties   in   the  Revolution.     Duyckinck  states,  on  the 

man  of  great  talents,  energy  in  business,  serenity  of  authority  of  Ashbel  Green's  Memoirs,  that  some  of  the 

temper,  and  eloquence  in  the  pulpit.      He  was  a  ripe  books  were  afterwards  found  in  North  Carolina,  left  there 

Latinist,  and  prepared  a  Latin  grammar  for  the  use  of  by  the  troops  of  Cornwallis.     But  this  is  at  least  doubt- 

the  college.      As  a  specimen  of  his  Latinity  there  is  ful.     The  Rev.  Dr.  John  Maclean,  now  at  an  advanced 

extant,   in  manuscript,    an  oration  in   that  language,  age,  but  still  vigorous,  was  inaugurated  the  tenth  pres- 

which  he  delivered  in  Newark  before  a  number  of  the  ident  of  Nassau  Hall  in  1854.  He  was  for  more  than  50 

trustees  on  the  death  of  Dr.  Philip  Doddridge,  who  had  years  an  officer  of  the  College,  and  is  now  preparing  its 

been  a  friend  of  the  college.     The  eulogy  by  William  History.     Having  favored  me  with  a  revision  of  this 

Livingston  on  occasion  of  his  death  celebrates  his  virtues  Sketch,  he  remarks  of  this  incident  as  well  as  of  any 


2o8  JTS  BENEFACTORS  AND  ILLUSTRIOUS  MEN. 

After  the  Revolution,  Witherspoon  resumed  his  duties  as  president,  which 
ended  only  at  his  death,  in  1794.  His  successor,  Dr.  Samuel  Stanhope  Smith, 
the  accomplished  scholar  and  orator,  rilled  that  post  during  the  next  eighteen 
years.  Dr.  Alexander,  in  his  memoirs  of  Smith,  describes  his  appearance  a*. 
Princeton  in  1801  :  '  Certainly,  viewing  him  as  in  his  meridian,  I  have  neve: 
seen  his  equal  in  elegance  of  person  and  manners.  Dignity  and  winning 
grace  were  remarkably  united  in  his  expressive  countenance.  His  large  blue 
eye  had  a  penetration  which  commanded  the  respect  of  all  beholders.  Not- 
withstanding the  want  of  health,  his  cheek  had  a  bright  rosy  tint,  and  his  smile 
lighted  up  the  whole  face.  The  tones  of  his  eloquence  had  a  thrilling  pecu- 
liarity, and  this  was  the  more  remarkable  in  his  preaching,  where  it  is  well 
known  that  he  imitated  the  elaborate  polish  and  oratorical  glow  of  the  French 
school.' 

Princeton  has  been  peculiarly  fortunate  both  in  her  presidents  and  pro- 
fessors. Ashbel  Green,  who  succeeded  Smith,  was  chaplain  to  Congress  in 
Philadelphia  from  1792  to  1800,  where  he  enjoyed  the  intimate  friendship  of 
Washington.  He  was  followed  in  1823  by  Dr.  James  Carnahan,  who  held 
the  chair  more  than  thirty  years.  The  tenth  president  was  Dr.  John  Mac- 
lean, still  living.  In  the  departments  of  mathematics  and  physical  science, 
the  methods  and  labors  of  Professors  Henry  and  Torrey,  and  those  of  Arnold 
Guyot,  and  Stephen  Alexander  the  astronomer,  gave  considerable  eclat  to  the 
institution. 

The  usefulness  of  the  College  of  New  Jersey  can  best  be  hinted  by  stating, 
that  the  entire  number  of  graduates  considerably  exceeds  five  thousand,  of 
whom  more  than  one-half  are  still  living.  It  would  be  sufficient  to  mention 
such  names  among  them  as  Dr.  Benjamin  Rush,  the  two  Richard  Stocktons, 
William  Paterson,  Tapping  Reeve,  David  Ramsay,  Dr.  Samuel  Spring,  Pier- 
pont  Edwards,  James  Madison,  President  of  the  United  States,  Aaron  Burr, 
Henry  Lee,  Morgan  Lewis,  Edward  Livingston,  John  Sergeant,  Samuel  L. 
Southard,  Theodore  Frelinghuysen,  and  a  long  roll  of  other  distinguished  men. 

The  benefactors  of  Princeton  College  are  too  many  to  enumerate.1 
Within  the  last  few  years  upwards  of  a  million  dollars  have  been  given  for 
new  buildings,  the  endowment  of  professorships,  and  the  establishment  of 
scholarships.     Dickinson   Hall,  recently  constructed  for  rooms  adapted  for 

special  plundering  of  the  Library  by  the  British  troops,  the  apparatus.     Here  we  saw  the  most  beautiful  ma- 

that  he  now  hears  of  it  for  the  first  ti/ne. — lam  chine,   an   orrery   or  planetarian,  constructed   by  Mi. 

only  too  happy  to  give  them  the  benefit  of  the  doubt  Rittenhouse,   of  Philadelphia.     By  this  time  the  bell 

They  need  it  bad  enough.  rang  for  prayers.     We  went  into  the  chapel  ;  the  presi- 

This  old  North  College,  the  original  Nassau  Hall,  dent  came  in  and  we   attended.     The  scholars  sing  as 

which   had   thus   suffered   the  attack  of    the    troops,  badly  as  the  Presbyterians  at  New  York.  After  prayers, 

was    destroyed    by   fire    in     1802.      Again    in     1855,  the  president  attended  us  to  the  balcony  of  the  college, 

March  oth,   it  was  entirely  burned.     The  pictures  in  where  we  had  the  prospect  of  a  horizon  of  about  eighty 

the  college  gallery  were  fortunately  preserved.     In  the  miles  in  diameter.' — Duyckinck's  Cyclopozdia,  p.  289. 
diary  of  John  Adams,  of  the  date  of  August  26th,  1774, 

when  the  young  lawyer  was  on  his  way  to  the  Conti-  1  Among  the  earlier  of  them  should  be  mentioned 

nental  Congress,  we  find  the  following  picture  :  Col.  Henry  Rutgers  and  his  family  of  New  York  ;  Elias 

'  The  College  is  conveniently  constructed  ;  instead  of  Boudinot,  who  founded  a  cabinet  of  Natural  History, 

entries  across  the  building,  the  entries  are  from  end  to  and  gave  §8,000  and  4,000  acres  of  land  ;  acid  Dr.  Da 

end,  and  the  chambers  are  on  each  side  of  the  entries,  vid    Hosock,  an  alumnus,  who  contributed  a  valuable 

There  are   such  entries  one  above  another  in  every  mineralogical  cabinet.     In  the  Philosophic  Hall  are  pi  c 

story.     Mr.  Houston,  the  professor  of  mathematics  and  served   the  electrical  machine  of  Franklin,  and  the  or- 

natural  philosophy,  showed  us  the  library ;  it  is  not  rery  of  Rittenhouse. 
large,  but  has  some  good  books.     He  then  led  us  into 


KING'S  COLLEGE— NOW  COLUMBIA.  209 

instruction  in  nearly  every  department,  was  founded  in  honor  of  Jonathan 
Dickinson,  the  first  president  of  Princeton,  by  his  lineal  descendant,  John 
C.  Green,  of  New  York,  whose  munificent  gifts  have  been  of  such  great 
service  to  the  institution,  and  cast  so  much  lustre  over  the  donor's 
name.  A  well-equipped  gymnasium  was  erected  in  1869,  at  a  cost  of 
$38,000,  by  Robert  Bonner,  the  journalist,  and  Henry  C.  Marquand. 
Three  years  later  Mr.  Marquand  gave  the  college  another  donation  of 
$100,000.  A  building  for  a  school  of  science  has  gone  up  to  the  eastward 
of  Dickinson  Hall,  founded  by  a  special  endowment  of  $200,000  from  Mr. 
Green,  whose  gifts  have  already  exceeded  half  a  million  dollars. 

No  little  portion  of  the  splendor  of  this  record  emanates  from  the  admi- 
rable genius,  learning,  and  Christian  humanity  of  Dr.  James  McCosh,  its 
eleventh  president,  who  left  his  native  hills  in  Ayrshire,  and  the  scenes  of  his 
scholarship  in  the  universities  of  Glasgow  and  Edinburgh,  and  the  Free 
Church  of  Scotland,  and  his  professorship  at  Queen's  College,  Belfast, 
Ireland,  to  reap  fresher  and  more  enduring  laurels  in  the  academic  groves 
which  surround  the  classical  structures  of  Princeton.  He  may  well  tread 
proudly,  yet  humbly,  in  the  footsteps  of  his  tv^o  fellow-countrymen — Wither- 
spoon  and  Maclean — of  Finley  the  scholarly  Irishman,  and  of  Edwards  the 
metaphysical  divine. 

King's  College — now  Columbia. — As  early  as  1703,  it  seems  from  the 
records  of  Trinity  Church,  says  Mr.  Duyckinck,  to  have  been  the  intention 
of  the  colonial  government  of  New  York,  then  represented  by  Lord  Corn- 
bury,  to  establish  a  college  on  this  island.  The  design  was  ultimately  carried 
into  effect,  although  not  till  forty-three  years  later,  when  a  provincial  act  was 
passed  for  raising  money  for  that  purpose  by  lottery.  The  sum  of  ^3,400, 
realized  from  this  measure,  was  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  trustees,  a  majority 
of  whom  were  members  of  the  Church  of  England,  several  of  them  being 
vestrymen  of  Trinity  Church.  The  feeling  of  loyalty  to  the  throne  was  very 
strong  in  New  York,  and  manifested  itself  in  a  warm  attachment  to  the 
Church  of  England.  This  blended  religious  and  political  sentiment  was 
always  specially  represented  by  Trinity  Church,  which  was  fostered  by  the 
home  government  and  sustained  by  the  influential  classes  in  society  and  by 
the  provincial  legislature.  Its  affairs  were  managed  with  great  ability  and 
discretion ;  it  received  vast  gifts,  and  became,  and  still  remains,  the  richest 
religious  corporation  on  the  continent. 

A  strong  opposition,  however,  was  early  brought  against  Trinity  corpora- 
tion, headed  by  Mr.  William  Livingston,  who  had  an  early  and  well-founded 
jealousy  against  the  development  of  any  hierarchical  principles  in  America. 
He  was  a  Presbyterian,  and  represented  the  claims  of  that  religious  body  with 
the  greatest  earnestness — perhaps  sometimes  with  unbecoming  zeal.  In  his 
periodical,  'The  Independent  Reflector,'  he  displayed  a  radical  republican 
spirit,  which  strikes  us  in  reading  it  at  such  a  length  of  time,  as  having  fore- 
shadowed with  a  prophetic  spirit  the  growing  political  tendencies  of  America. 
H 


*lo  ITS  FOUNDERS  AND  EARL  Y  FRIENDS. 

Livingston  and  his  party  thwarted  for  a  long  time  the  proposed  royal  charter, 
and  tried  to  substitute  another  institution  under  an  act  of  the  Assembly  to  take 
possession  of  the  funds.  But  on  the  31st  of  October,  1754,  the  charter  of  King's 
College  was  granted,  and  although  it  lost  half  of  the  royal  endowment,  yet 
it  soon  entered  on  a  career  of  prosperity,  chiefly  through  the  auspicious  for- 
tune which  decided  that  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson  should  become  its  first  president 
This  man  of  moulding  genius,  was  destined  to  confer  upon  the  island  and 
the  State  of  New  York  blessings  which  at  our  time  can  be  but  feebly  com- 
prehended. Born  in  Guilford,  Connecticut,  educated  at  Yale,  studying  divi- 
nity, and  accompanying  President  Butler  to  England  for  Episcopal  ordination, 
he  returned  to  Stratford  a  missionary  of  The  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the 
Gospel.  Endowed  with  keen  metaphysical  perception,  and  an  exquisite  sen- 
sibility for  the  spiritual,  he  was  carried  captive  by  the  theory  of  Idealism 
advocated  by  Berkeley,  whose  acquaintance  he  had  already  made.  After 
the  failure  of  his  Bermuda  plan,  Berkeley  had  become  interested  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  college  in  New  York.  The  University  of  Oxford  had  conferred 
upon  Johnson  the  degree  of  Doctor  in  Divinity.  Dr.  Franklin,  who  knew 
his  accomplishments,  was  anxious  to  have  him  take  charge  of  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania,  then  being  founded ;  but  he  was  already  pledged  to  the 
trustees  of  King's  College,  and  in  1754  he  reached  New  York  prepared  to 
enter  upon  his  duties.  The  college  was  organized  in  May,  1755,  when  Trinity 
Church  conveyed  to  its  governors  the  tract  of  land  which  afterwards  became 
so  valuable,  enclosed  by  Church,  Barclay,  and  Murray  Streets,  and  the  Hudson 
River.  Only  two  conditions  were  affixed  to  the  gift — the  president  should 
always  be  a  member  of  the  Church  of  England,  and  its  liturgy  should  be  used 
in  the  services  of  the  college.  Beyond  this  there  was  no  exclusion  for 
religious  opinions. 

When  Johnson  took  charge  of  the  college  he  was  in  his  58th  year— 'mature 
in  judgment,  ripe  in  scholarship,  commanding  in  character,  and  beneficent 
in  spirit.  The  college  was  ultimately  to  enjoy  a  large  revenue  from  its 
lands,  and  to  receive  generous  gifts  from  all  quarters ;  but  it  had  little  money 
to  begin  with.  Mr.  James  Jay  was  sent  to  England  to  get  help ;  and  asso- 
ciated with  him  was  Dr.  Smith,  provost  of  the  college  in  Philadelphia.  They 
met  a  generous  reception,  returned  with  the  means  for  a  fair  start  for  both 
institutions,  and  they  began  to  build. 

In  1 763  Dr.  Johnson  retired  from  the  presidency  to  his  pastorate  at  Strat 
ford,  where  he  passed  eleven  years  of  serenity  and  usefulness,  dying  in  1772, 
at  the  age  of  seventy-five.  In  Chandler's  Life  of  Johnson  we  are  told  that 
he  desired,  like  his  friend  Berkeley,  to  die  suddenly  in  his  own  home,  and 
such  a  departure  was  vouchsafed  to  him.1 

1  The  visitor  to  the  old  graveyard  at  Stratford  will  If  learning  free  from  pedantry  and  pride  ; 

find  these  lines  on  his  monument.     They  were  written  If  faith  and  virtue  walking  side  by  side  ; 

by  Dr.  Cooper,  Johnson's  -successor  : —   .  If  well  to  mark  his  being's  aim  and  end, 

If  decent  dignity  andooodest  mien,  To  shine  through  life  the  father  and  the  friend  ', 

The  cheerful  heart,  and  countenance  serene  ;  If  these  ambition  in  thy  soul  can  raise, 

If  pure  religion  and  unsullied  truth,  Excite  thy  reverence  or  demand  thy  praise, 

His  age's  solace,  and  his  search  in  youth  ;  Reader,  ere  yet  thou  quit  this  earthly  scene. 

In  charity,  through  all  the  race  he  ran,  Revere  his  name,  and  be  what  he  has  been. 
Still  wishing  well,  and  doing  good  to  man ; 


ITS  FOR  TUNES  D  URING  THE  RE  VOL  UTION.  211 

Before  his  retirement  Dr.  Johnson  applied  to  Archbishop  Seeker  for  an  as- 
sistant who  might  become  his  successor.  He  sent  Myles  Cooper  in  1762. 
At  the  early  age  of  twenty-eight  he  became  president  of  the  college.  He 
was  distinguished  for  scholarship  and  exuberance  of  rhyme,  which  went  undei 
the  name  of  poetry,  great  devotion  to  the  Church  of  England,  and  a  still 
more  enthusiastic  adherence  to  the  obnoxious  principles  and  rubbish  of 
Toryism.1 

Cooper  made  no  attempt  to  conceal  his  Toryism.  He  was  believed  to 
have  '  had  a  hand '  in  a  very  obnoxious  pamphlet  which  appeared  on  the 
breaking  out  of  the  Revolution,  which  was  answered  with  signal  ability  by  one 
of  his  own  students  who  had  matriculated  at  the  college  in  1774.  I  speak  of 
Alexander  Hamilton,  then  a  young  stripling,  who  was  preparing  himself  by 
exhaustive  study  in  mathematics,  classics,  and  law  for  the  wonderful  career 
Providence  had  marked  out  for  him  in  his  adopted  country.  Indignation 
against  the  Tory  plotter  grew  fierce.  A  letter  appeared  in  April,  1775, 
signed  'Three  Millions/  recommending  him  and  his  confreres  to  'fly  for 
their  lives,  or  anticipate  their  doom  by  becoming  their  own  executioners.' 
On  the  night  of  May  10,  after  Hamilton  and  his  faithful  companions  had 
destroyed  the  guns  on  the  battery,  and  one  of  their  comrades  had  fallen,  the 
mob  became  incensed,  and  proceeded  to  expel  Dr.  Cooper,  from  the  college. 
Hamilton  and  Troup,  students,  ascended  the  steps,  to  restrain  the  rioters, 
Hamilton  addressed  them  on  '  the  excessive  impropriety  of  their  conduct, 
and  the  disgrace  they  were  bringing  on  the  cause  of  liberty,  of  which  they  pro- 
fessed to  be  the  champions.'  Dr.  Cooper,  who  mistook  the  case,  and  thought 
he  was  exciting  the  people,  cried  out  from  an  upper  window,  '  Don't  listen  to 
him,  gentlemen  ;  he  is  crazy,  he  is  crazy.'  But  Hamilton  kept  them  en- 
gaged till  the  Tory  president  escaped.2  He  made  his  way  half  dressed  over 
the  college  fence,  and  wandered  by  the  shore  of  the  Hudson  till  near  morning, 
when  he  found  shelter  in  the  old  Stuyvesant  mansion  in  the  Bowery,  where 
he  passed  the  day,  and  was  at  night  taken  on  board  the  Kingfisher,  Captain 
James  Montagu,  an  English  ship-of-war  in  the  harbor,  in  which  he  sailed  to 
England.3 

» I  am  largely  indebted  to  Duyckinck's  Cyclojxzdia  Chloe,  Delia  and  Silvia  :  put  old  stories  of  cuckoldry 
for  these  sketches  of  our  early  colleges  and  libraries,  and  into  epigrams,  and  wrote  heroic  little  poems  on  ladies' 
have  drawn  from  this  source  freely.  Having  often  gaiters  ;  at  times  subsiding  into  tranquillity  in  an  ode 
verified  his  accuracy  by  consulting  the  authorities  he  to  contentment,  or  some  touching  lines  to  a  singing 
depended  on,  I  have  been  impressed  with  the  extreme  bird  in  confinement,  and  rising — if  it  be  rising — into 
care  with  which  he  prepared  that  work.  If  there  be  dull  stanzas  on  sacred  subjects — for  all  of  these  things 
a  large  range  of  so-cailed  authorities  which  the  con-  did  Myles  Cooper  in  his  salad  days  at  Oxford,  before 
scientious  historian  must  beware  of,  it  is  what  goes  he  came  to  America  to  confront  the  '  sons  of  liberty ' 
under  the  name  of  American  historical  writings.  It  is  on  the  Hudson.  It  is  not  likely  that  he  brought  many 
this  quality  which  gives  so  great  a  value  to  this  Cyclo-  copies  of  his  poems  over  for  the  use  of  the  students  and 
pa;dia.  I  should  add  that  Mr.  T.  Ellwood  Zell,  the  the  eyes  of  sober  Dr.  Johnson,  of  Connecticut,  with  the 
enterprising  Philadelphia  publisher,  has  rendered  a  letter  of  the  archbishop.  Someofhisversesarecen.su- 
high  service  to  the  cause  of  American  Literature  by  rable,  though  the  taste  of  the  age  allowed  publications 
issuing  a  gready  enlarged  and  improved  edition,  of  the  then  to  gentlemen  which  the  more  delicate  standard  of 
original  work,  brought  down  to  the  present  time  by  Mr.  the  present  day  would  reject.  ...  In  this  old 
M.  Laird  Simons,  on  whose  impartiality  and  diligent  British  period  the  young  president's  manners  and  con- 
research  too  high  praise  can  hardly  be  bestowed.  As  vivial  habits  were  much  admired.  He  was  a  member 
it  now  appears,  it  is  altogether  the  ablest  and  most  at-  of  a  literary  club  which,  like  those  of  modern  days, 
tractive  work  of  its  kind  that  has  yet  appeared.  mixed  up  a  little  literature  with  a  great  deal  of  convivi- 

Mr.  Duyckinck  says  that  the  year  after  Cooper  took  ality.' — Duyckinck's  Cyclojxzdia,  p.  394. 
his  degree  of  Master  of  Arts  at  Oxford  he  published  ,  L;f     f  Hamilton  by  John  C.  Hamilton,  vol.  i. 

by  subscription  a  volume  of  poems  in  that  city.     •  They  .       . 

are  occasional  verses,  amatory  and  bacchanalian,  full  3  President  Moore's  '  Historical  '  Sketch  of  Colun* 

of  the  spirit  of  the  old  English  gendeman  who  sang  of  bia  College.' 


212  KINGS  BECOMES  COLUMBIA  COLLEGE. 

King's  College  considered  itself  lucky  in  getting  rid  of  its  young  president 
with  so  little  trouble.  Cooper's  place  was  immediately  filled  by  Rev.  Benja- 
min Moore  ;  but  the  college  was  soon  occupied  as  a  military  hospital,  and 
the  library  scattered.  Some  kind  hands  preserved  a  few  of  the  volumes,  and 
many  years  afterwards  they  were  found  in  a  small  room  of  St.  Paul's  Chapel. 

The  British  holding  possession  of  New  York,  King's  College  had  no 
record  to  leave  until  the  restoration  of  peace,  when  the  iron  crown  was 
removed  from  the  edifice,  and  with  it  the  very  name  of  the  institution  perished. 
One  of  the  last  students  to  leave  King's  College  was  Alexander  Hamilton. 
The  first  student  who  offered  himself  for  examination  to  Columbia  College, — > 
made  such  by  the  new  organization  of  trustees  in  1787, — was  DeWitt  Clin- 
ton. He  who  was  to  become  the  first  citizen  of  the  Empire  State,  was  followed 
by  a  student  who  was  afterwards  to  become  one  of  the  first  citizens  of  Virginia 
— John  Randolph  of  Roanoke. 

Under  its  new  and  national  name,  baptized  into  the  spirit  of  liberty,  and 
fired  by  the  inspirations  of  a  new  age,  the  college  began  its  fresh  career  in 
1787.  The  trustees  invited  to  the  presidency,  William  Samuel  Johnson,  of 
Stratford,  the  son  of  the  first  president.  He  was  fifty  years  of  age,  had  won 
distinction  at  Yale  and  Harvard,  been  a  delegate  to  the  Congress  of  1765  at 
New  York,  and  served  with  ability  as  agent  of  Connecticut  in  England,  where 
he  formed  intimate  acquaintance  with  Berkeley,  Lowth,  and  his  great  name- 
sake, Dr.  Samuel  Johnson — those  intellectual  kings  of  the  British  world.  He 
became  a  Fellow  of  the  Royal  Society,  and  Oxford  honored  him  with  the  degree 
of  Doctor  of  Divinity.  He  was  a  delegate  to  the  convention  which  framed  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  while  Congress  sat  in  New  York  he 
represented  Connecticut  in  that  body,  and  with  Ellsworth,  his  noble  colleague, 
helped  to  form  the  judiciary.  On  the  removal  of  Congress  to  Philadelphia, 
he  resigned  his  senatorship,  and  devoted  himself  exclusively  to  the  affairs  of 
the  college  till  the  first  year  of  the  present  century,  when  he  withdrew,  covered 
with  honors  and  ripe  with  years ;  but  his  life  was  prolonged  to  the  age  of 
ninety-two ;  he  still  enjoyed  ease  with  dignity,  and  the  priceless  luxuries  of 
learning,  honor,  and  virtue.1 

During  the  presidency  of  Bishop  Benjamin  Moore — 1801  to  181 1 — the 
college  gained  steadily  in  efficiency.  Rev.  William  Harris  succeeded 
Bishop  Moore,  holding  the  presidency  eighteen  years,  when  the  honorable 
William  A.  Duer  was  elected.  He  held  the  place  from  1829  till  1842.  This 
eminent  scholar,  attorney,  legislator,  and  jurist,  brought  to  his  station  rare 
abilities,  and  still  rarer  culture.  His  presidency  imparted  to  the  college  a 
new  lustre — all  its  departments  were  made  broader  and  more  efficient,  while 
under  the  succeeding  presidencies  of  Nathaniel  F.  Moore  and  Charles  King, 

1  In  his  article  on  President  Johnson,  in  Knapp's  And  glides  in  pious  innocence  away  ; 

American  Biography,  Verplanck  applied  to  the  Strat-  Whose  peaceful  day  benevolence  endears, 

ford  sage  the  fine  lines  of  the  author  of  the  Rambler  ; —  Whose  night  congratulating  conscience  cheers, 

'The  virtues  of  a  temperate  prime,  The  general  fav'rite  as  the  general  friend, 

Bless  with  an  age  exempt  from  scorn  or  crime,  Such  age  there  is,  and  who  shall  wish  its  end  ? ' 

An  age  that  melts  with  unperceived  decay, 


PRESENT  CONDITION  OF  COLUMBIA.  213 

assisted  by  an  able  corps  of  professors,  among  whom  Dr.  Anthon  as  a  clas- 
sical scholar,  Professor  James  Renwick  as  a  scientist,  Dr.  Henry  J.  Anderson 
as  a  mathematician,  Dr.  Lieber  as  a  political  economist,  Dr.  Davies  as  a 
mathematician,  and  Dr.  John  Torrey,  not  only  among  the  ablest  botanists  of 
his  time,  but  a  collector  of  the  most  extensive  botanical  collection  on  the 
continent,  new  splendor  was  thrown  over  the  institution.  Dr.  Torrey's  collec- 
tion contains  over  fifty  thousand  specimens  of  plants,  which  cost  its  founder 
the  labor  of  forty  years. 

Dr.  Barnard,  now  presides  over  the  college,  having  brought  to  his  post, 
ten  years  ago,  broader  and  riper  knowledge  on  the  great  subject  of  education 
than  almost  any  of  his  contemporaries.  Columbia  College  has  always  been 
distinguished  as  a  classical  school,  and  it  has  justly  claimed  eminence  for  the 
thoroughness  of  its  Law  Department.  It  has  a  large  School  of  Medicine,  and 
among  its  lecturers  and  professors  in  the  several  departments,  situated  as  it 
is  in  the  centre  of  the  great  metropolis,  the  resources  it  could  draw  from 
were  almost  unlimited.  Its  new  School  of  Mines  is  one  of  the  most  tho- 
rough and  prosperous  in  the  country.  The  revenue  of  the  college  is  large, 
derived  less  from  benefactors  than  from  the  increased  value  of  its  real  estate. 
Its  libraries  in  all  departments,  its  scientific  apparatus,  the  number  of  its 
students — now  nearly  one  thousand, — the  ability  of  its  corps  of  professors, 
all  combine  to  render  it  one  of  the  noblest  institutions  of  learning  in  the 
country.1 

The  University  of  Pennsylvania. — Franklin  was  its  father.  In  his  Auto- 
biography, he  tells  us  that  in  1 743  he  had  laid  before  Richard  Peters  the  plan 
of  an  academy  in  Philadelphia.  Six  years  later  he  revised  it,  with  the  co- 
operation of  Thomas  Hopkinson,  and  other  good  citizens.  When  he  pub- 
lished his  pamphlet — 'Proposals  Relative  to  the  Education  of  Youth  in  Penn- 
sylvania,' he  took  care  to  represent  it,  '  not  as  an  act  of  mine,  but  as  some 
public-spirited  gentlemen,  avoiding  as  much  as  I  could,  according  to  the 
usual  rule,  the  presenting  myself  to  the  public  as  the  author  of  any  scheme 
for  their  benefit.' 

In  an  admirable  address  *  before  the  Alumni  of  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, Nov.  13,  1849,  Mr-  William  B.  Reed  speaks  of  the  first  board  of  trus- 
tees as  'men  of  character,  standing,  and  learning;  or  where,  as  with  the  greatest 
of  them  mere  scholarship  was  wanting,  of  masculine  intelligence,  and  pure, 
vigorous,  American  mother  wit ;  while  the  master-spirit  then,  as  the  master- 
spirit in  every  effort  to  do  public  good,  from  the  hour  when  he  landed  penni- 
less at  Market  Street  wharf,  till  the  distant  day  when,  at  the  end  of  almost  a 

1  The  esprit  de  corfs,  and  the  sturdy  manhood  which  vocates  of  rural  colleges  ;  and  much  has  been  said  and 

characterize   the    students  of  Columbia   College,  were  sung  about  rustic  virtue  and  sylvan  shades,  the  inno- 

commendably  displayed  at  the  great  university  regatta  cence  of  country  life,  and  the  charms  of  bucolic  man- 

at  Saratoga  during  this  month  of  July,  1874.     Their  ners  ;   but  it  has   long  been  my  conviction   that   the 

sturdy  character,  fine  discipline,  and  admirable  pluck,  highest  inspirations  of  science  and  learning  are  felt 

gave  them    an   easy  and  brilliant  victory.      In   fact,  where  the  lights  of  civilization  blaze  with  the  greatest 

the  record  of  Columbia  College  affords  a  fine  argument  intensity.     Large  cities  have  been  the  seats  of  the  chief 

for  those  who  claim,  that  institutions  of  learning  grow  intellectual  triumphs  of  the  race  in  all  ages.     The  men 

up  under   the  fairest  auspices  in  a  great  metropolis,  who  are  to  control  the  future  must  pass  through  th« 

Ingenious  and  touching  pleas  are  entered  by  the  ad-  hottest  fires. 


214  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  PENNSYLVANIA. 

century,  he  was  carried  amidst  mourning  crowds  and  tolling  bells  to  hii 
modest  and  almost  forgotten  grave,  was  Benjamin  Franklin.  His  mind  con 
ceived,  and  his  energy  achieved  the  first  Philadelphia  college.' 

All  the  charter  privileges  it  desired,  it  obtained  by  successive  Acts.  In 
1755,  Rev.  William  Smith  became  the  first  provost.  He  was  a  Scotchman, 
and  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Aberdeen.  Unlike  his  contemporary, 
Myles  Cooper,  he  at  once  espoused  the  cause  of  American  liberty  with  all 
the  ardor  of  his  generous  nature,  and  brought  to  his  aid  exquisite  learning 
and  commanding  eloquence.  In  1758  he  wrote  *  An  Earnest  Address  to  the 
Colonies,'  rousing  the  country  to  union  against  the  French.  On  the  23d  of 
June,  1775,  he  pronounced  a  powerful  military  discourse,  which  greatly 
helped  the  good  cause  of  independence.  At  the  invitation  of  Congress,  he 
delivered  an  oration  in  memory  of  General  Montgomery,  and  a  finished 
eulogium  on  Benjamin  Franklin  before  the  American  Philosophical  Society, 
March  1,  1791. 

The  College  grew  rapidly  into  fame  under  Smith's  administration.  Among 
other  learned  men  whose  accomplishments  were  invoked,  was  Dr.  Benjamin 
Rush,  who  became  professor  of  chemistry;  and  as  early  as  1767  the  Medical 
Department  was  founded,  which  has  since  attained  such  enviable  distinction 
as  a  school  of  learning. 

Toryism  was  as  rampant,  and  perhaps  still  more  virulent  in  Philadelphia 
than  in  New  York,  and  an  attempt  was  made  to  degrade  the  College  into  a 
Church  of  England  institution.  But  to  the  glory  of  the  men  of  that  time  be 
it  said,  they  fought  inch  by  inch  any  and  all  attempts  to  create  any  harlot 
embrace  between  church  and  state — least  of  all  were  institutions  of  learning 
to  be  prostituted  to  the  debauching  influences  of  sectarianism  fostered  by 
legislation.  In  1779,  in  the  very  heat  of  the  Revolution,  the  Legislature  of 
the  State  annulled  the  charter,  took  away  its  funds,  and  created  a  new  insti- 
tution, with  liberal  grants  out  of  the  confiscated  estates  of  the  royalists  j  and 
over  the  ashes  of  Franklin's  perverted  college  rose  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, which  at  once  assumed  those  fair  proportions  which  were  adapted  to 
the  new  American  System  of  Life,  whose  foundations  were  then  being  laid  by 
the  great  builders  of  a  civilization  for  the  future. 

The  spirit' of  the  old  college,  divested  somewhat  of  its  antiquated  notions 
resumed  life  enough  to  procure  a  law  in  1789,  reinstating  the  trustees  and 
faculties  in  their  former  estates  and  privileges.  It  was  reorganized  in  the 
house  of  Dr.  Franklin  under  better  auspices,  which  led,  two  years  later,  to 
another  act  of  the  Legislature,  blending  the  two  institutions ;  and  from  which 
time  we  hear  only  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania.  Dr.  Ewing,  David  Ritten- 
house,  John  McDowel,  Bishop  Delancey,  John  Andrews,  John  Ludlow,  Dr. 
Henry  Vethake,  all  rendered  good  service  to  the  institution.  Finally,  in  t868, 
Charles  Janeway  Stills  became  the  tenth  provost.  He  fully  merited  the 
praise  the  trustees  bestowed  on  him  ;  '  He  inspired  his  college,  and  the  trus- 
tees, with  confidence  in  his  views ;  devoted  his  time  and  energies  to  the  pre- 
paration of  the  plans  for  carrying  them  into  execution;  and  finally  succeeded 


RHODE  ISLAND  COLLEGE— BROWN  UNIVERSITY.         2x5 

in  securing  their  adoption.'  The  effects  of  those  labors  are  visible  in  the 
stately  collegiate  edifice  lately  erected  in  West  Philadelphia,  and  in  the 
thorough  organization  of  the  new  Department  of  Science  on  a  scale  equa. 
to  those  of  Arts,  Medicine,  and  Law.1 

Firmly  established,  well  endowed,  and  in  permanent  and  spacious  quarters, 
the  University  of  Pennsylvania  now  ranks  among  the  most  thorough,  pros- 
perous, and  promising  of  the  institutions  of  learning  in  America. 

Rhode  Island  College — now  Brown  University. — This  seat  of  learning, 
which  during  the  first  century  of  its  existence  made  a  record  so  honorable 
to  its  founders,  and  the  learned  and  virtuous  men  who  have  since  guided  its 
fortunes,  owes  its  origin  mainly  to  a  suggestion  made  by  Rev.  Morgan  Ed- 
wards, a  Welsh  clergyman  of  Philadelphia,  to  the  Philadelphia  Association 
so  called,  comprising  the  Baptist  churches  in  Pennsylvania  and  New  Jersey. 
The  Rev.  James  Manning,  a  native  of  New  Jersey  and  graduate  of  Princeton, 
was  authorized  to  open  the  scheme  to  certain  prominent  Baptists  of  New- 
port, then  under  the  government  of  the  colony,  to  establish  a  learned  institu- 
tion in  the  interests  of  their  denomination.  At  a  meeting  of  the  friends  of  the 
enterprise,  held  in  July,  1763,  at  the  house  of  Colonel  Gardner,  the  deputy 
governor,  the  plan  was  matured,  and  the  necessary  committees  were  appoint- 
ed. In  the  following  year,  February,  1764,  a  charter  was  obtained  from  the 
General  Assembly,  '  for  a  College  or  University  in  the  English  colony  of 
Rhode  Island  and  Providence  plantations  in  New  England,  in  America.' 
Although  it  was  understood  that  the  institution  was  to  owe  its  origin  to  the 
Baptists,  and  be  founded  and  sustained  by  them,  yet  in  the  spirit  of  Roger 
Williams,  some  of  the  chief  provisions  of  the  charter  were  as  follows : 

"  And  furthermore  it  is  hereby  enacted  and  declared,  That  into  this  liberal 
and  catholic  institution  shall  never  be  admitted  any  religious  tests.  But,  on 
the  contrary,  all  the  members  hereof  shall  forever  enjoy  full,  free,  absolute 
and  uninterrupted  liberty  of  conscience  :  And  that  the  places  of  Professors, 
Tutors,  and  all  other  officers,  the  President  alone  excepted,  shall  be  free  and 
open  for  all  denominations  of  Protestants  :  And  that  youth  of  all  religious 
denominations  shall  and  may  be  freely  admitted  to  the  equal  advantages, 
emoluments  and  honors  of  the  College  or  University  ;  and  shall  receive  a  like 
fair,  generous  and  equal  treatment  during  their  residence  therein,  they  con- 
ducting themselves  peaceably,  and  conforming  to  the  laws  and  statutes, 
thereof.  And  that  the  public  teaching  shall,  in  general,  respect  the  sciences  ; 
and  that  the  sectarian  differences  of  opinion  shall  not  make  any  part  of  the 
public  and  classical  instruction. 

The  government  of  the  College  is  vested  in  a  Board  of  Fellows,  consisting 
of  twelve  members,  of  whom  eight,  including  the  President,  must  be  Baptists  ; 

1  The  Department  of  Arts  was  established  in  1755  ;  quarter  acres,  bounded  by  Locust,    Spruce,  Thirty- 

that  of  Medicine  in  1765  ;  of  Law  in  1789;  that  of  fourth,  and  Thirty-sixth  Streets.    Within  two  years  the 

the  Auxiliary  Faculty  of  Medicine  in  1864  ;    Science  new  stone  structure  was  completed,  at  a  cost  of  a  quar- 

in  1872.  ter  of  a  million  dollars.     The  noble  hall  of  learning  waj 

In   1870  the  univerity  bought  of  the  city,  at  the  inaugurated  October  ti,  1872. 
nominal  price  of  $8,000  an  acre,  a  tract  of  ten  and  a 


216  ITS  SUCCESSION  OF  EMINENT  MEN. 

and  a  Board  of  Trustees,  consisting  of  thirty-six  members,  of  whom  twenty 
two  must  be  Baptists,  five  Friends  or  Quakers,  four  Congregationalists,  and 
five  Episcopalians.  These  represent  the  different  denominations  existing  in 
the  State  at  the  time  when  the  charter  was  obtained.  The  instruction  and 
immediate  government  of  the  College  rest  forever  in  the  President  and  Board 
of  Fellows. 

The  work  of  the  college  commenced  at  once.  Manning  was  chosen  the 
first  president,  and  he  began  instruction  in  his  own  house  at  Warren,  where  the 
first  commencement  was  held  on  the  first  Wednesday  in  September,  1769. 
The  local  contest  for  the  seat  of  the  college  was  terminated  by  the  selection 
of  Providence,  where,  in  May,  1 7  70,  the  corner-stone  of  *  University  Hall,' 
was  laid.  As  with  nearly  all  our  institutions  of  learning,  the  course  of  in- 
struction was  interrupted,  or  entirely  suspended  during  the  Revolution.  The 
college  building  was  occupied  by  the  State  militia,  and  the  French  troops  of 
Rochambeau.  In  1786,  President  Manning  was  elected  to  Congress,  where 
he  gave  all  his  influence  to  the  establishment  of  the  Constitution.  After  re- 
signing his  seat,  he  returned  to  the  duties  of  the  college,  which  he  discharged 
with  great  fidelity  till  his  death  in  1791,  at  the  age  of  fifty-three.  Of  his 
striking  qualities,  Allen  says  :  *  With  a  dignified  and  majestic  appearance  his 
address  was  manly,  familiar  and  engaging.' 

His  successor  in  1792,  Rev.  Jonathan  Maxey,  has  left  a  name  memorable 
in  the  annals  of  American  education.  He  was  successively  president  of  three 
colleges,  succeeding  Edwards  the  younger  at  Union,  after  he  left  the 
Rhode  Island  Institution  in  1802,  and  becoming  the  first  president  of  the 
College  of  South  Carolina,  at  Columbia,  where  he  died  in  1820.  In  Judge 
Pitman's  Address  to  the  Alumni  of  Brown  University,  September  5,  1843,  he 
characterizes  him  as  a  *  man  of  great  dignity  and  grace  in  his  manner  and  de- 
portment, with  a  countenance  full  of  intellectual  beauty ; '  and  he  speaks 
genially  of  his  musical  voice,  graceful  action,  and  harmonious  periods.' 

The  third  president,  Rev.  Asa  Messer,  who  had  been  a  graduate  and  long 
tutor  and  professor  of  languages  and  mathematics,  held  the  office  from  1802 
to  1826,  and  under  his  management  the  institution  grew  strong  and  command- 
ing in  its  influence,  changing  its  name,  as  tjie  charter  had  given  it  a  right  to 
do,  'in  honor  of  its  greatest  and  most  distinguished  benefactor.'  This  honor 
fell  worthily  to  Nicholas  Brown,  whose  ancestors  had  come  from  England 
with  Roger  Williams.1 

Dr.  Francis  Wayland,  who  succeeded  Messer  in  1827,  and  held  the  presi- 
dency till  he  resigned  in  1855,  has  left  a  most  enviable  fame  for  his  great 
services  in  the  cause  of  higher  education   as  a  teacher  and  writer.     He  was 

1  He  was  a  graduate  of  the  college  under  President  By  his   liberality  the    institution   was  placed    on  its 

Manning.     He  became  a  member  of  the  corporation  in  present  footing   of  usefulness.     For  the  library  of  th« 

1701,  and  was  punctilious  in  attention  to  its  interests,  university  and  the  erection  of  Manning  Hall  he  gave 

His  mercantile  life  brought  him  great  wealth.    In  1804,  nearly  $30,000,  also  the  land  for  a  third  college  build« 

naving  previously  given  a  law  library,  he  founded  a  ing,  and  for  the  president's  house.     This  worthy  bene* 

professorship  of  oratory  and  belles-lettres,  and  in  1823  factor  died  at  Providence,  in  the  seventy-third  year  of 

erected  a  second  college  building,  which  was  called  his  age,  September  27,  1841. — Duyckinck's  Cyclop* 

after  the  Christian  name  of  his  sister,  Hope  College,  dia,  p.  542. 
He  presented  the  college  with  astronomical  apparatus. 


IT±  PRESENT  RESO  UR  CES  AND  STANDING.  2 1 7 

identified  very  closely  with  the  affairs  of  his  religious  denomination,  and  in 
raising  a  higher  standard  for  pulpit  training,  and  his  style  as  a  philosophical 
writer  is  distinguished  for  force  and  clearness,  his  many  accomplishments  ren- 
dering him  one  of  the  first  pulpit  orators  of  his  time. 

Dr.  Barnas  Sears  was  president  during  the  next  twelve  years,  when  he  re- 
signed to  accept  the  position  which  had  been  unanimously  tendered  him,  as 
Agent  of  the  Peabody  Fund  in  the  South.  He  was  succeeded  by  Dr.  Alexis 
Caswell,  who  for  thirty-five  years  had  been  a  prominent  and  useful  professor 
in  the  University.  Dr.  E.  G.  Robinson,  the  present  incumbent,  entered  upon 
his  duties  in  1872.  His  large  experience  as  an  educator,  his  rare  talents  as  an 
orator,  his  kindly  sympathies  and  manly  independence,  make  him  popular 
with  the  students,  and  a  general  favorite  in  the  community.  Under  his  admin- 
istration the  University  thrives,  with  bright  prospects  for  the  future. 

The  thoroughness  of  Dr.  Sears' s  studies,  his  strong  proclivities  for  higher 
education,  his  broad  opportunities  at  home  and  abroad  for  the  observation 
of  academic  systems,  with  his  own  popular  administration  of  the  affairs  of  the 
University,  enabled  him  to  render  it  the  highest  services.  The  year  1864, 
the  University  having  completed  the  first  century  of  its  existence,  he  de- 
livered an  historical  Discourse,  which  is  one  of  the  best  contributions  yet  made 
to  the  grand  theme  of  education  in  connection  with  civil  and  religious  liberty. 

The  names  of  the  benefactors  of  Brown  University  embrace  those  of  the 
best  citizens  of  New  England.  The  little  commonwealth  of  Roger  Williams 
has  taken  a  just  pride  in  sustaining  its  principal  school  of  learning,  and  it 
may  well  congratulate  itself  on  the  high  position  it  has  reached,  the  good  it 
has  accomplished,  and  the  honor  it  has  shed  upon  the  State.  The  college 
library  contains  nearly  fifty  thousand  volumes.  Its  Museum  of  Natural  His- 
tory holds  a  valuable  collection  of  specimens ;  its  course  in  agriculture  and 
science  is  thorough  and  practical ;  its  Gallery  contains  a  valuable  collection  of 
portraits ;  and  its  invested  funds  exceed  seven  hundred  thousand  dollars. 
Mr.  John  Carter  Brown,  a  son  of  the  Hon.  Nicholas  Brown,  has  recently  be- 
queathed a  fine  lot  of  land,  and  fifty  thousand  dollars,  for  the  erection  of  a  new 
Library  Building. 

Rutgers  College. — This  institution,  which  has  become  so  eminent,  owes  its 
existence  to  the  learning  and  piety  of  the  clergy  who  accompanied  the  early 
Dutch  emigrants  to  New  York,  and  New  Jersey.  Connected  as  they  were 
with  the  established  church  of  Holland,  and  having  for  a  long  time  no  desire 
to  sever  their  relations  with  the  home  organization,  they  were  satisfied  with 
the  arrival  of  accessions  to  the  ministry,  without  sending  their  candidates  for 
ordination  across  the  Atlantic.     But  these  accessions  were  so  few,  and  the 

1  Dr.  Reuben  A.  Guild,  the  librarian  of  the  insti-  of  the  humane  and  enlightened  scholar.     In  1858  Mr. 

tution,  has  published  in  his  "  Life,  Times,  and  Cor-  Guild  published  the  Librarian's  Manual,  the  best  work 

respondence  of  James  Manning,  and  the  Early  History  of  the   kind   we  have  any  knowledge  of.     In  1867,  he 

of  Brown   University,"  the    most   complete  work  of  also   published   the    "  History   of  Brown   University 

its  kind  yet  produced  in  this  country.     It  is  written  in  with     illustrative     documents,"    an  elegantly   printed 

a  liberal  spirit,  minute  in  its  information,  and  enriched  quarto  volume  of  458  pages,  embellished  with  portraits 

by  leirning,  and   glowing  with  the  warm   sympathies  and  engravings. 


218        RUTGERS  COLLEGE— ITS  STRUGGLES  REWARDED. 

expense  and  delay  of  the  voyage  were  so  great,  it  was  resolved  to  establish  a 
school  of  theology  at  New  Brunswick,  and  have  the  power  of  ordination  con- 
ferred by  the  church  in  Holland  on  its  American  offspring.  A  charter  of 
incorporation  for  an  institution  under  the  title  of  Queen's  College,  was  ob- 
tained in  1770.  Its  board  of  trustees  met  at  the  Court-house  of  Bergen 
Count},  and  elected  Rev.  Dr.  Jacobus  R.  Hardenbergh  their  president.  At 
this  time,  John  H.  Livingston,  of  the  New  York  family  of  that  name,  was 
pursuing  his  studies  preparatory  to  ordination  in  Holland,  and  he  obtained 
from  the  parent  church,  their  consent  to  a  separate  organization  of  American 
congregations,  on  condition  that  they  should  establish  a  theological  profes- 
sorate, '  as  the  church  of  Holland  could  not  and  would  not  acknowledge  and 
maintain  any  connection  with  a  church,  which  did  not  provide  herself  with 
an  educated  ministry.' 

These  conditions  were  complied  with.  Livingston  returned  after  his  ordi- 
nation, and  became  minister  of  the  Dutch  Church  in  New  York,  and  profes- 
sor of  Divinity.  Financial  embarrassment  caused  the  literary  exercises  of 
the  college  to  be  suspended  in  1 795  ;  but  they  were  revived  again  under  the 
energetic  and  self-sacrificing  labors  of  Dr.  Ira  Condict  in  1807.  No  union, 
however,  of  the  theological  professorate  with  Queen's  College  was  effected 
till  1 8 10,  when  Dr.  Livingston  removed  to  New  Brunswick,  and  from  this 
period  >may  date  the  prosperity  of  the  college.  Receiving  no  aid  from  the 
State  of  New  Jersey,  and  little  assistance  from  any  other  quarter,  its  instruc- 
tions had  been  given  in  temporary  localities,  and  no  one  professorship  was 
fully  provided  for.  But  with  pious  zeal  and  unflagging  energy,  Dr.  Livingston 
maintained  his  professorship,  and  did  much  to  sustain  the  institution.  The 
College  was,  however,  closed  again  from  18 16  to  1825.  At  the  latter  date  it 
was  entirely  reorganized ;  its  name,  in  consideration  of  the  services  of  Col. 
Henry  Rutgers,  was  change4  from  '  Queens '  to  '  Rutgers ; '  a  new  cove- 
nant was  entered  into  between  its  Board  of  Trustees — whose  strength  was 
greatly  increased  by  the  election  of  Abraham  Van  Nest — and  the  Synod  of 
the  Dutch  Reformed  Church  ;  and  Rev.  Philip  S.  Milledoler  became  Presi- 
dent. At  the  age  of  nineteen,  this  brilliant  young  man  was  called  to  the 
church  in  Nassau,  between  Fulton  and  John  streets.  He  afterwards  became 
pastor  of  the  New  Dutch  Church  in  Rutgers  street.  Finally,  under  the 
patronage  of  the  General  Synod  of  the  Dutch  Reformed  Church,  other  profes- 
sorships were  established,  and  filled  by  learned  men  who  afterwards  became 
eminent ;  among  them  Dr.  De  Witt,  who  so  long  and  successfurly  maintained 
his  lofty  position. 

Theodore  Strong,  LL.D.,  devoted  thirty-four  years  as  an  educator  in  Rut- 
gers. When  Dr.  Brownlee  resigned  his  professorship  to  accept  a  call  to  the 
Collegiate  Church  of  New  York,  he  was  succeeded  by  Joseph  Nelson,  LL.D., 
the  celebrated  blind  teacher.1 

1  In  the  Alumni  address  of  1852,  the  Rev.  Abraham  and   a  thorough  acquaintance  with  the  studies  of  his 

Polhemus  says  of  Professor  Nelson  : — '  He  was  at  the  department,  he  conducted  the  exercises  of  his  room 

time  of  his  appointment,  and  had  been  for  a  number  of  to  the  very  general  improvement  of  his  students  and 

years,  totally  blind  :  but  with  great  powers  of  memory,  acceptance  of  the  Board.     I  remember  him  well ;  ho* 


ITS  REORGANIZATION  AND  PERMANENT  ENDOWMENTS.  219 

Honorable  A.  Bruyn  Hasbrouck  assumed  the  presidency  after  the  resigna- 
tion  of  Dr.  Milledoler  in  1840,  and  resigning  ten  years  later,  Hon.  Theodore 
Frelinghuysen  took  his  place.  This  gentleman's  father,  Frederick,  had  served 
his  country  in  the  Continental  Congress,  resigning  his  seat  to  become  cap- 
tain of  a  volunteer  corps,  and  serving  in  the  army  to  the  end  of  the  war,  after- 
wards becoming  Senator  of  the  United  States.  The  son  had  followed  the 
career  of  the  bar,  and  became  in  181 7  Attorney-General  of  the  State ;  an  office 
which  he  held  till  he  was  elected  to  the  United  States  Senate  in  1826,  where 
he  served  two  terms.  In  1838  he  became  chancellor  of  the  University  of  the 
City  of  New  York,  and  twelve  years  later  resigned  the  position  to  become 
president  of  Rutger's  College.  He  held  this  office  till  1862,  when  he  died  at 
New  Brunswick  on  the  12th  of  April.  He  was  a  pure  and  noble  character; 
a  statesman  of  large  views  and  unsullied  integrity,  an  enthusiast  in  the  cause 
of  education,  and  dedicated  heart  and  soul  to  works  of  religion  and  philan- 
thropy. As  president  of  the  Board  of  Missions,  and  also  of  the  Bible  So- 
ciety, the  neglected  and  the  destitute  of  distant  nations  rose  up  to  call  him 
blessed. 

After  Mr.  Frelinghuysen' s  decease,  the  College,  in  consequence  of  its  in- 
sufficient endowment,  and  of  the  depression  occasioned  by  the  late  war,  was 
threatened  with  destruction.  In  this  emergency,  Rev.  Wm.  H.  Campbell, 
D.D.,  was  called  from  his  professorship  of  Hebrew  and  Oriental  literature  in 
the  Theological  Seminary,  to  assume  the  Presidency  in  1863.  By  his  inde- 
fatigable efforts,  crowned  as  they  have  been  with  remarkable  success,  the  in- 
stitution has  been  remodelled  in  all  respects,  and  placed  on  a  basis  of  large 
and  lasting  prosperity.  It  has  been  declared  to  be  a  literary  college,  entirely 
independent  of  the  Theological  Seminary,  and  of  the  General  Synod  of  the 
Reformed  Church  ;  several  hundred  thousand  dollars  have  been  added  to  its 
permanent  funds ;  many  new  professorships  have  been  created,  and  filled  with 
competent  scholars ;  several  large  and  costly  buildings  have  been  erected ; 
and  the  number  of  students  increased  from  sixty-five,  to  over  two  hundred. 
Among  its  professors  stands  the  distinguished  name  of  Geo.  H.  Cook,  who,  as 
conductor  of  the  Geological  Survey  of  New  Jersey,  and  as  the  adviser  in 
manifold  agricultural  and  mineral  enterprises,  ranks  among  the  most  useful  and 
practical  scientists  of  the  United  States.  A  legacy  of  Mrs.  Littleton  Kirkpatrick 
raised  a  memorial  chapel  and  library,  at  an  expense  of  fifty  thousand  dollars. 
In  1864  the  legislature  of  New  Jersey  chose  Rutgers  College  as  the  seat  of 
tfye  Scientific  School,  to  be  sustained  by  the  interest  of  the  money  accruing 
from  the  sale  of  210,000  acres  of  the  public  domains  voted  by  Congress  to  the 
State  of  New  Jersey  for  the  establishment  of  such  a  school.  A  Model  Farm  of 
100  acres  was  connected  with  the  college.  The  school  of  science,  which  was 
also  constituted  by  the  legislature  the  State  College  for  Agriculture  and  the  Me- 

he  would  sit  with  his  thumb  upon  the  dial  of  his  watch,  phabetical  order,  he  would  detect  the  location  of  the 

marking  the  minutes  as  they  passed,  allowing  to  each  slightest  whisper,  and  when  rebuking  an  individual  by 

6tudent  his  allotted  portion,  and  the  facility  with  which  name  for  the  noise,  it  was  rare  indeed  that  the  person 

he  would  incidentally  detect  the  least  mistake  in  the  charged   had   an  opportunity  of  entering    a  protest 

reading  of  the  text  or  translation.     And  I  remember,  against  the  justice  of  his  suspicions.' — Page  6. 
too,  that  nice  ear  by  which,  with  his  class  sitting  in  al- 


22o  ORIGIN  OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE. 

chanic  Arts,  enjoys  a  liberal  income,  for  which  it  provides  forty  State  scholar- 
ships, whose  appointments  are  wisely  left  to  the  superintendents  of  the  various 
counties. 

Having  thus  surmounted  all  the  obstacles  it  encountered  in  its  early  his- 
tory, Rutgers  College  now  stands  forth  fair,  and  strong  in  the  affections  of  the 
people  of  New  Jersey,  and  New  York.  And  well  may  this  metropolis  extend 
to  that  institution  its  generous  sympathy  and  aid ;  for  the  great  and  good  men 
who  devoted  their  lives  to  building  it  up,  were  nearly  all  of  them  directly 
allied  with  the  interests  of  learning  in  New  York,  and  in  the  cause  of 
morals  and  religion  in  this  vast  community.  They  mingled  in  our  best 
society,  diffusing  through  our  higher  circles,  and  over  all  our  institutions  of 
religion,  the  pure  spirit  of  Christianity,  and  the  priceless  treasures  of  learning 
and  culture. 

Dartmouth  College. — We  are  arrested  a  moment  at  the  spot  where  the 
little  rivulet  bubbled  forth  from  the  hillside  springs  in  the  village  of  Lebanon, 
Connecticut,  one  hundred  and  twenty  years  ago,  and  which  has  been  sending 
forth  its  life-giving  waters  to  the  nations.  The  founier  of  Dartmouth  College 
was  Dr.  Eleazer  Wheelock,  whose  name,  it  has  been  well  said,  might  more 
properly  have  been  borne  by  that  school  than  that  of  the  English  statesman. 
Wheelock  was  descended  from  a  line  of  godly  ministers  of  New  England. 
He  carried  the  first  Berkeley  premium  from  Yale  College,  and  began  life  as 
a  pedagogue  after  the  fashion  of  the  times,  one  of  his  pupils  being  Samson 
Occom,  a  Mohegan  Indian.  The  savage  turned  out  so  good  a  scholar,  that 
the  master  set  up  an  Indian  missionary  school  to  raise  Indian  teachers. 
A  good  farmer,  Joshua  Moor,  of  Mansfield,  in  1754,  gave  a  house  and  two 
acres  of  land  adjoining  Wheelock' s  residence  for  the  school.  Occom  went  to 
England  and  raised  money,  which  was  deposited  with  a  board  of  trustees,  of 
which  Lord  Dartmouth,  one  of  the  subscribers,  was  president.  Wheelock' s 
success  suggested  the  removal  of  the  school  to  closer  proximity  with  the  New 
England  tribes,  and  various  offers  of  situations  were  made  to  him  from  Albany, 
from  Berkshire  County,  where  Jonathan  Edwards  was  then  writing  the  Essay 
on  the  Will,  and  from  other  places.  He  at  last  decided  on  Hanover,  in  the  west- 
ern part  of  New  Hampshire,  near  the  Connecticut  River.  In  1769  Governor 
Wentworth  granted  a  charter  for  the  institution,  which  in  honor  of  Lord  Dart- 
mouth was  named  Dartmouth  College.  Thus  at  the  age  of  sixty,  Dr.  Whee 
lock  moved  into  the  wilderness,  and  with  his  family  and  students  built  some 
log  huts.  In  '  The  Memoirs  of  the  Rev.  Eleazer  Wheelock,  founder  of  Dart- 
mouth, by  M'Clure  and  Elijah  Parish,  181 1,'  we  have  the  following  picturesque 
glimpses  of  the  new  college  settlement :  ■  Upon  a  circular  area  of  six  acres 
the  pines  were  felled,  and  in  all  directions  covered  the  ground  to  the  height 
of  about  five  feet.  One  of  these  was  two  hundred  and  seventy  feet  in  height. 
Paths  of  communication  were  cut  through  them.  The  lofty  tops  of  these  sur- 
rounding forests  were  often  seen  bending  before  the  northern  tempest,  while 
the  air  below  was  still  and  piercing.    The  snow  lay  four  feet  in  depth,  betweeB 


,      DARTMOUTH  REFOUNDED  BY  DANIEL  WEBSTER,        22' 

four  and  five  months.  The  sun  was  invisible  by  reason  of  the  trees,  until 
risen  many  degrees  above  the  horizon.  In  this  secluded  retreat,  and  in  these 
humble  dwellings,  this  enterprising  colony  passed  a  long  and  dreary  winter. 
The  students  pursued  their  studies  with  diligence ;  contentment  and  peace 
were  not  interrupted  even  by  murmurers.  A  two-story  college  was  erected, 
and  in  1771  four  students  graduated,  one  of  whom  was  John  Wheelock,  son 
of  the  first,  and  the  future  president  of  the  College.'  ■ 

The  founder  died  in  1779,  aged  sixty^eight,  and  his  son  succeeded  him. 
He  had  served  as  a  tutor  till  the  Revolution  opened,  when  he  carried  his  mus- 
ket with  Stark  and  Gates.  At  the  close  of  the  war,  he  went  to  Europe,  to 
get  help,  taking  with  him  letters  from  Washington,  who  spoke  of  him  as  a 
brave  officer,  and  from  the  French  minister  Luzerne,  to  the  Count  de  Vergen- 
nes.  Reaching  Paris,  Franklin  and  John  Adams  gave  him  letters  to  the 
Netherlands,  where  the  Prince  of  Orange  and  his  friends  made  generous  con- 
tributions to  the  Wilderness  College.  In  England  he  procured  valuable 
donations  and  philosophical  instruments.  He  was  wrecked  on  Cape  Cod 
coming  home,  reaching  the  shore  with  his  life.  But  the  gifts  to  the  college, 
that  came  in  another  vessel,  were  saved. 

For  thirty-six  years  he  toiled  for  Dartmouth.  The  rise  of  a  hostile  party 
in  the  State,  gave  Wheelock  an  opportunity  to  appeal  to  the  Legislature  to 
redress  his  private  wrongs.  He  asked  their  interposition  against  a  majority 
of  the  Faculty  who  had  not  approved  of  his  administration.  His  '  Memorial' 
brought  on  the  legal  controversy  which  ended  in  his  removal  by  the  Trustees. 
The  State  then  interposed.  The  Legislature,  in  1816,  created  a  new  cor- 
poration, changing  the  corporate  title  to  Dartmouth  University,  and 
vesting  the  property  in  a  new  board.  But  the  old  trustees  disregarded  this 
legislation,  and  commenced  an  action  for  the  recovery  of  the  property. 
The  case  went  against  them  in  the  State  Court,  but  it  was  appealed 
to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  at  Washington,  in  18 19,  where 
Daniel  Webster  appeared  as  their  advocate,  at  the  age  of  thirty-five,  and 
by  his  learning  and  eloquence  laid  the  corner-stone  of  his  future  fame  as 
a  constitutional  lawyer.  It  was  the  fairest  opportunity  fortune  could  give. 
He  had  graduated  from  Dartmouth  only  seventeen  years  before,  and  had 
already  argued  their  case  in  the  State  court ;  and  now,  in  pleading  the  cause 
of  learning,  and  the  sacredness  of  its  chartered  rights,  he  found  the  inspi- 
ration which  not  only  swayed  the  judgment  of  that  bench  of  jurists,  and 
secured  the  admiration  and  love  of  Chief  Justice  Marshall,  but  won  his  case, 


1  ■  Another  graduate  was  Levi  Frisbie,  fatherof  the 
poet,  and  himself  a  writer  of  verses,  in  some  of  which 
he  has  celebrated  the  peculiar  circumstances  in  which 
his  Alma  Mater  was  founded  : — 
"  Forlorn  thus  youthful  Dartmouth  trembling  stood, 

Surrounded  with  inhospitable  wood  ; 

No  silken  furs  on  her  soft  limbs  to  spread, 

No  dome  to  screen  her  fair,  defenceless  head  ; 

On  every  side  she  cast  her  wistful  eyes, 

Then  humbly  raised  them  to  the  pitying  skies. 

Thence  grace  d  vine  beheld  her  tender  care, 


And  bowed  an  ear,  propitious  to  her  prayer. 
Soon  chang'd  the  scene  ;  the  prospect  shines  mor« 

fair  ; 
Joy  lights  all  faces  with  a  cheerful  air ; 
The  buildings  rise,  the  work  appears  alive, 
Pale  fear  expires,  and  languid  hopes  revive, 
Calm  solitude,  to  liberal  science  kind, 
Sheds  her  soft  inlluence  on  the  studious  mind  ; 
Afflictions  stand  aloof ;  the  heavenly  powers 
Drop  needful  blessings  in  abundant  showers.' 


222        WHAT  DARTMOUTH  HAS  DONE  FOR  THE  WORLD. 


and  with  it  the  gratitude  of  his  clients,  and  the  affection  of  the  friends  of  learn, 
ing  all  over  the  world.1 

The  eminent  Joseph  Hopkinson,  of  Philadelphia,  one  of  the  associate 
counsel  in  the  case,  in  communicating  the  decision  to  President  Brown  said : 
1 1  would  advise  you  to  inscribe  over  the  door  of  your  institution,  Founded 
by  Eleazer  Wheelock :  refounded  by  Daniel  Webster?  President  Wheelock 
was  not  restored  after  these  troubles  :  he  died  only  two  months  later — April, 
1817 — aged  sixty- three.2 

Thus  permanently  founded,  Dartmouth  has  been  steadily  advancing  in  its 
solid  work.  It  has  taken  high  rank  as  a  school  of  classical  learning  and 
modern  science.  If  it  has  not  been  so  richly  endowed,  nor  put  forth  such 
large  pretensions,  all  its  work  has  been  well  and  carefully  done.  Its  graduates 
have,  in  diverse  fields  of  labor,  illustrated  the  soundness  of  their  scholarship 
and  the  breadth  of  their  attainments ;  and  it  has  recently  received  striking 
proofs  of  the  hold  it  has  upon  the  hearts  of  the  friends  of  learning.' 

Libraries,  as  well  as  colleges  and  men,  may  be  classed  among  the  mould- 
ers of  society.     Some  words  are  due  to  the  Library  Company  of  Philadelphia, 

1  In  an  article  by  Mr.  George  Ticknor,  in  the 
American  Quarterly  Review  for  June,  1831,  that  ele- 
gant scholar  says  of  Webster's  argument : 

'  He  opened  his  cause  with  perfect  simplicity  in  the 
general  statement  of  its  facts,  and  then  went  on  to  un- 
fold the  topics  of  his  argument  in  a  lucid  order,  which 
made  every  position  sustain  every  other.  The  logic 
and  the  law  were  rendered  irresistible.  As  he  advanced 
his  heart  warmed  to  the  subject  and  the  occasion. 
Thoughts  and  feelings  that  had  grown  old  with  his 
best  affections  rose  unbidden  to  his  lips.  He  remem- 
bered that  the  institution  he  was  defending  was  the 
one  where  his  own  youth  had  been  nurtured  ;  and  the 
moral  tenderness  and  beauty  this  gave  to  the  grandeur 
of  his  thoughts,  the  sort  of  religious  sensibility  it  im- 
parted to  his  urgent  appeals  and  demands  for  the  stern 
fulfilment  of  what  law  and  justice  required,  wrought 
up  the  whole  audience  to  an  extraordinary  state  of  ex- 
citement.' 


3  This  great  battle  was  fought  by  them  not  for  them- 
selves only  ;  the  principles  concerned  were  vital  to  many 
other  institutions  of  learning.  It  is  certainly  to  the 
praise  of  Dartmouth,  that,  in  comparative  poverty  and 
alone,  she  was  thus  instrumental  in  vindicating  and 
establishing  the  sacredness  of  private  eleemosynary 
trusts.  To  this  category,  in  the  judgment  of  the  court, 
the  institution  belonged.  A  contract,  they  held,  was 
involved  ;  and  no  State  might  pass  a  law  "  impairing 
the  obligation  of  contracts."— <9/</««^iV*7w,  Dec,  1873. 

9  The  whole  number  of  its  alumni,  including  all  the 
departments,  is  five  thousand  three  hundred  and  seven- 
teen. These  have  come  from  all  parts  of  the  land  ; 
and,  as  graduates,  have  been  scattered  as  widely. 
While  a  considerable  number  have  entered  from  the 
cities  and  large  towns,  the  great  majority  have  come 
from  rural  places.  The  average  age  of  admission  has 
been  somewhat  above  that  at  many  other  colleges  ;  and 
to  the  maturity  thus  secured  has  been  added,  in  many 
cases,  the  stimulus  of  self-dependence.  From  these 
and  other  causes,  Dartmouth  students,  as  a  class,  have 
been  characterized  by  a  spirit  of  earnestness,  energy, 
and  general  manliness,  of  the  happiest  omen  as  to 
their  life-work  Most  of  them  have  gone,  not  into  the 
more  lucrative  lines  of  business,  but  into  what  may  be 
called  the  working  professions.  To  the  ministry,  the 
college  has  given  more  than  one  thousand  of  her  sons. 
Dr.  Chapman  says,  in  his  '  Sketches  of  the  Alumni,' 
published  in  1867  :  'There  have  been  thirty-one  judges 
of  the  Unitsd  States  and  State  Supreme  Courts  ;  fifteen 
senators  in  Congress  ;   and  sixty-one  representatives  ; 


two  United  States  cabinet  ministers  ;  four  ambassadors 
to  foreign  courts  ;  one  postmaster-general ;  fourteen 
governors  of  States,  and  one  of  a  Territory ;  twenty- 
five  presidents  of  colleges  ;  one  hundred  and  four  pro- 
fessors of  academical,  medical,  or  theological  colleges.' 
Perhaps  the  two  professions  that  have  drawn  most 
largely  upon  the  institution  have  been  those  of  teaching 
and  the  law.  We  recall  a  single  class,  that  of  1828, 
one-fourth  of  whose  members  have  been  either  college 
presidents  or  professors.  Dr.  Chapman  states,  that  at 
one  time  there  were  residing  in  Boston,  Mass.,  no  less 
than  seven  sons  of  the  college,  "who  were  justly  re- 
garded as  ranking  among  the  brightest  luminaries  of 
the  law.  They  were  Samuel  Sumner  Wilde,  1789  ; 
Daniel  Webster,  1801  ;  Richard  Fletcher,  1806  ;  Joseph 
Bell,  1807;  Joel  Parker,  1811  ;  Rufus  Choate,  1819; 
and  Charles  Bishop  Goodrich,  1822.'  " — Old  and  New, 
Dec.,  1873. 

The  faculty  of  instruction  by  the  catalogue  of  1873 
embraced  thirty-six,  and  in  all  the  different  courses  of 
study  four  hundred  and  twenty  students  from  twenty- 
five  different  States  and  Territories  at  home  and  abroad, 
grouped  as  follows  :  Academical,  two  hundred  and 
sixty-four  ;  medical,  fifty-one  ;  scientific  sixty-three  ; 
agricultural,  twenty-three  ;  Thayer  department,  seven. 
A  number  of  libraries  were  accessible  to  the  students 
besides  that  of  the  college;  and  these  numbered 
over  forty  thousand  volumes.  A  gymnasium  was 
erected  for  their  use  in  1867,  by  the  gift  of  George  H. 
Bissell,  at  an  expense  of  twenty-four  thousand  dollars. 
This  institution  has  over  a  hundred  scholarships — 
State,  ministerial,  and  individual.  The  New  Hamp- 
shire College  of  Agriculture  and  Mechanic  Arts  was 
founded  by  the  Legislature  in  1866,  on  the  basis  of  the 
Congressional  Land  Grant,  and  connected  with  Dart- 
mouth. Another  new  associate  department  is  the 
Thayer  School  for  Civil  Engineering,  established  by  a 
donation  of  seventy  thousand  dollars  from  General 
Sylvanus  Thayer,  of  Braintree,  Massachusetts.  Two 
other  notable  gifts  have  been  lately  received — sixty 
thousand  dollars  for  the  Agricultural  Department  from 
John  Conant,  of  Jaffray,  and  fifteen  thousand  dollars 
from  E.  W.  Stoughton,  of  New  York  City,  to  found  a 
Museum  of  Pathological  Anatomy.  Within  the  last 
ten  years,  more  than  five  hundred  thousand  dollars 
have  been  secured  for  the  various  departments.  But 
with  the  restrictions  imposed  on  some  of  the  gifts,  with 
the  remaining  wants  of  existing  foundations,  with  the 
plans  of  enlargement  and  improvement  in  the  minds  of 
the  trustees  and  faculty,  and  with  the  increased  num- 
ber of  students,  there  is  a  present  need  of  as  much 
more. 


THE  LIBRARY  COMPANY  OF  PHILADELPHIA.  223 

which  was  founded  on  the  8th  of  November,  1731,  three  months  before  the 
birth  of  Washington.1 

Mr.  Logan,  'a  gentleman  of  universal  learning,  and  the  best  judge  of  books 
in  these  parts,'  made  out  the  list,  which  was  entrusted  to  Thomas  Hopkinson, 
who  was  about  sailing  for  England,  with  a  draft  on  London  in  his  favor  for 
^45.  Charles  Brockden,  the  uncle  of  Brockden  Brown,  the  novelist,  drew 
up  the  original  constitution.  The  books  arrived  in  October,  1732,  with  valu- 
able donations,  among  them  Sir , Isaac  Newton's  philosophical  works,  from 
Franklin's  friend  Peter  Collinson.  In  December  of  that  year,  Dr.  Franklin 
prepared  and  printed  the  catalogue  without  charge.  The  first  American 
donor  was  William  Rawle,  who  presented  a  set  of  the  works  of  Edmund 
Spenser,  in  six  volumes.  In  1733  Thomas  Penn,  the  son  of  the  Quaker  king, 
made  some  gifts,  and  promised  a  lot  of  ground  for  a  building.  The  following 
year  he  presented  an  air-pump,  accompanied  by  a  complimentary  letter,  in 
which  he  says :  •  It  always  gives  me  pleasure  when  I  think  of  the  Library 
Company  of  Philadelphia,  as  they  were  the  first  that  encouraged  knowledge  and 
learning  in  the  province  of  Pennsylvania.' 2  In  1 740,  as  the  Library  grew, 
the  Assembly  granted  for  its  use  a  room  in  the  State  House ;  and  in  1762  the 
building-lot  promised  by  the  Penn  family  was  conveyed  to  the  institution. 

From  that  time  to  the  present,  the  library  has  been  growing,  and  its 
history  reads  more  like  a  fascinating  romance,  than  like  a  sober  record  of 
tomes  and  scientific  apparatus.  In  1767,  a  woman's  hand,  taken  from  an 
Egyptian  mummy,  in  good  preservation,  was  sent  over  by  Benjamin  West. 
In  1773  the  library  was  removed  to  the  second  floor  of  Carpenter's  Hall,  and 
for  the  first  time  opened  daily.  When  Congress  assembled  in  1774,  the  free 
use  of  the  library  was  tendered  to  its  members.  In  1789,  a  suitable  building 
was  erected  on  the  corner  of  Fifth  Street,  facing  the  State  House  Square.  It 
bears  an  inscription  prepared  by  Franklin,  with  the  exception  of  the  portions 
relating  to  himself,  which  were  added  by  the  committee  having  the  matter  in 
charge  : — '  Be  it  remembered  in  honor  of  the  Philadelphia  youth  [then  chiefly 
artificers]  that  in  MDCCXXXL,  they  cheerfully,  at  the  instance  of  Benjamin 
Franklin,  one  of  their  number,  instituted  the  Philadelphia  Library,  which, 
though  small  at  first,  has  become  highly  valuable  and  extensively  useful,  and 
which  the  walls  of  this  edifice  are  destined  to  contain  and  preserve ;  the  first 
stone  of  whose  foundation  was  here  placed  the  31st  day  of  August,  1789.' 

During  the  construction  of  the  edifice,  a  number  of  apprentices  engaged 
on  the  work,  were  allowed  by  their  masters  to  give  an  amount  of  labor  equiva- 

-The  first  record  of  this  institution  is  as  follows  :  —  '  Gentlemen  :  The  subscription  to  the  library  being 

"The  minutes  of  me,  Joseph  BreintnalL,  Secretary  to  completed,  you,  the  directors  appointed  in  the  instru- 

the  Directors  of  the  Library  Company  of  Philadelphia,  ment,  are  desired  to  meet  this  evening  at  five  o'clock, 

with  such  of  the  minutes  of  the  same  directors  as  they  at  the  house  of  Nicholas  Scull,  to  take  bond   of  the 

ordered  me  to  make,  begun  on  the  8th  day  of  Novem-  treasurer  for  the  faithful  performance  of  his  trust,  and 

ber,  1731.     By  virtue  of  the  deed  or  instrument  of  said  to  consider  of  and  upon  a  proper  time  for  the  payment 

Company,  dated  the  first  day  of  July  last .  of  the  money  subscribed,  and  other  matters  relating  to 

'The  said  instrument  being  completed  by  fifty  sub-  the  said  library, 
serrations,  I  subscribed  my  name  to  the  following  sum-  'Joseph  Breintnall,  Secretary.' 

Baons  or  notice,   which  Benjamin   Franklin  sent  by  a 

messenger,  viz.  :  To  Benjamin  Franklin,  Thomas  Hop-  2 'This  praise  'says   Mr.  Duyckinck,  'is  not   ill 

kinson,  William   Parsons,  Philip   Syng,  Jr.,   Thomas  deserved,  as  at  the  time  of  its  foundation,  there  was  nol 

Godfrey,    Anthony   Nicholas,   Thomas    Cadwallader,  even  a  good  book-store  accessible  nearer  than  Boston. 
John  Jones,  Jr.,  Robert  Brace,  and  Isaac  Pennington  : 


224  THE  REDWOOD  LIBRARY— BISHOP  BERKELEY. 

lent  to  the  purchase-money  of  a  share,  and  thus  constitute  themselves  mem- 
bers. In  1790  William  Bingham,  a  wealthy  and  liberal  citizen,  having  heard 
that  the  directors  intended  to  place  a  statue  of  Franklin  in  a  niche  in  front 
of  the  building,  volunteered  to  present  the  work  to  the  institution.  A  bust 
and  full-length  drawing  were  sent  to  Italy  for  the  guidance  of  the  artist  by 
whom  the  statue,  which  still  graces  the  niche,  was  executed. 

In  1 791  the  free  use  of  the  library  was  tendered  to  the  President  and 
Congress  of  the  United  States,  and  the  bujlding  was  enlarged  to  accommo- 
date the  Loganian  library ;  and  the  same  year  the  manuscripts  of  John  Fitch, 
relating  to  the  steam-engine,  were  deposited  in  the  library,  with  a  condition 
that  they  should  remain  unopened  until  the  year  1823.  The  Library  now — 
1874 — numbers  about  100,000  volumes.  It  has  been  a  fountain  of  light  and 
knowledge,  not  only  for  Philadelphia,  but  the  whole  country. 

The  Redwood  Library. — In  1 730,  one  year  before  Franklin  founded  the 
Library  Company  of  Philadelphia,  a  select  number  of  gentlemen,  at  Newport, 
organized  an  association  '  for  the  promotion  of  knowledge  and  virtue.'  New- 
port was  already  celebrated  for  its  foreign  commerce,  which  had  enriched  the 
town,  and  it  was  the  chosen  residence  of  a  large  cluster  of  the  most  cultivated 
men  of  the  country.  This  coterie  was  distinguished  for  the  rank  and  learning 
of  its  members.  It  was  intended  to  be  chiefly  a  literary  club  and  debating 
society,  whose  members  could  introduce  distinguished  strangers  who  were 
attracted  to  Newport  by  the  beauty  of  the  location,  and  the  culture  of  its  citi- 
zens. This  scene  of  literary  activity  was  greatly  stimulated  by  the  presence  of 
Berkeley.1    There  was  no  lack  of  funds  for  their  purpose.    Abraham  Redwood, 

1  A  further  tribute  to  Berkeley  may  be  admitted  :  Europe  of  the  eighteenth  century  offered  no  theatre. 

Among  the  most  distinguished  sons  of  Ireland  of  that  He  longed  to  divest  himself  of  European  dignities,  and 

day,  was  George  Berkeley,  whOj  like  Penn  and  Locke,  regarding  '  the  well-being  of  all  men,  of  all  nations,'  as 

garnered  up  his  hope9  for  humanity  in  America.   Versed  the  design  in  which  the  actions  of  each  individual  should 

in  ancient  learning,  exact  science,  and  modern  litera-  concur,  he  repaired  to  the  new  hemisphere  to  found  a 

ture  ;  disciplined  by  polished  society,  by  travel,  and  re-  university.— Bancroft,  vol.  iii.  pp.  372-3. 

flection,  he  united  innocence,  humility,  and  extensive  Berkeley  spent  more  than  two  years  in  America, 

knowledge,  with  the  sagacity  and  confidence  of  intu-  and  returned  to  Europe  '  to  endow  a  library  in  Rhode 

ition  and  reason.     Adverse  factions  agreed  in  ascribing  Island  ;  to  cherish  the  interests  of  Harvard  ;  to  gain  a 

to  him   '  every  virtue   under  heaven.'      Beloved   and  right  to  be  gratefully  remembered  at  New  Haven  ;  to 

cherished  by  those  who  were  the  pride  of  English  let-  encourage  the  foundation  of  a  college  in  New  York, 

ters  and  society,  favored  with  unsolicited  dignities  and  Advanced  to  a  bishopric,  the  heart  of  the  liberal  and 

revenues,  his  mind  asked  for  its  happiness,  not  fortune  catholic  prelate  was  in  America.      He  loved  the  sim- 

or  preferment,  but  a  real  progress  in  knowledge;   so  plicity  and  gentle  virtues  which  its  villages  illustrated, 

that  he  dedicated  his  age  as  well  as  his  early  years —  and  as  he  looked  into  futurity,  the  ardor  of  his  benev» 

the  later  growths  as  well  as  the  first-fruits — at  the  altar  olence  dictated  his  prophecy  : 
of  truth.     The  material  tendencies  of  the  age  in  which 

he  lived  were  hateful  to  his  purity  of  sentiment ;  and  In  happy  climes,  the  seat  of  innocence, 

having  a  mind  kindred  with  Plato  and  the  Alexandrine  Where  nature  guides,  and  virtue  rules  : 

philosophers,  with  Barclay  and  Malebranche,  he  held  Where  men  shall  not  impose,  for  truth  and  sense,  i 

that  the  external  world  was  wholly  subordinate  to  intel-  The  pedantry  of  courts  and  schools  ; — 
ligence  ;    that  of  spirits  alone  true  existence  can  be 

predicated.      He  did   not  distrust   the  senses,    being  There  shall  be  sung  another  golden  age, — 
rather  a  close  and  exact  observer  of  their  powers,  and  The  rise  of  empire  and  of  arts, —                                   1 
.finely  discriminating    between   impressions  made    on  The  good  and  great  inspiring  epic  rage — 
them  and  the  inferences  of  reason.     Far  from  being  The  wisest  heads  and  noblest  hearts.                           > 
skeptical,  he  sought  to  give  to  faith  the  highest  cer- 
tainty, by  deriving  all  knowledge  from  absolutely  per-  Not  such  as  Europe  breeds  in  her  decay; 
lect  intelligence — from  God.      If  he  could  but  expel  Such  as  she  bred  when  fresh  and  young, 
matter  out  of  nature  ; '  if,  in  a  materialist  age,  he  could  When  heavenly  flame  did  animate  her  clay, 
establish  the  supremacy  of  spirit  as  the  sole  creative  By  future  poets  shall  be  sung, 
power  and  active  being — then  would  the  slavish  or  cor- 
rupt theories  of  Epicurus  and  of  mobs  be  cut  off  by  Westward  the  course  of  empire  takes  its  way, 
the  roots,  and   totally  extirpated.      Thus  he   sought  The  four  first  acts  already  past, 
gently  to  unbind  the  ligaments  which  chained  the  soul  The  fifth  shall  close  the  drama  with  the  day, 
to  the  earth,  and  to  assist  her  flight  upwards  towards  Time's  noblest  offspring  is  the  last, 
sovereign  good.     For  the  application  of  such  views, 


DR.  CHANNING  IN  THE  REDWOOD  LIBRARY.  225 

a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  and  a  man  of  great  wealth  and  liberality, 
who  had  removed  to  Newport  from  Antigua,  gave  five  hundred  pounds  ster- 
ling for  the  purchase,  in  London,  of  standard  works,  and  recommended  the 
erection  of  a  library  building.  In  its  seventeenth  year  the  society  procured 
a  charter  of  incorporation  from  the  colony,  under  the  name  of  'The  Company 
of  the  Redwood  Library.'  Mr.  Henry  Collins  gave  a  lot  of  land,  on  which 
the  building,  soon  after  erected,  now  stands ;  and  five  thousand  pounds  were 
readily  raised  for  its  construction.  The  plan  of  the  main  edifice  has  always 
been  admired  for  the  elegance  of  its  Doric  simplicity. 

Under  the  direction  of  so  learned  and  refined  a  society,  the  library  soon 
grew  into  the  choicest  collection  of  books  on  the  continent ;  and  for  a  long 
time  it  offered  its  invaluable  aid  to  many  of  the  best  scholars  in  America. 
While  Dr.  Stiles  resided  on  the  island,  he  profited  greatly  by  its  literary  treas- 
ures, and  contributed  to  it  many  valuable  works.  Dr.  William  Ellery  Chan- 
ning  has  left  a  record  of  the  obligations  he  owed  to  it,  especially  during 
the  period  of  his  earlier  studies.  In  his  discourse  on  '  Christian  Worship,'  at 
the  dedication  of  the  Unitarian  Congregational  Church,  at  Newport,  July 
27th,  1836,  while  speaking  of  the  exquisite  beauty  of  the  scenery,  and  of  the 
value  to  him  of  the  Redwood  Library,  he  says  : — 

1  On  looking  back  to  my  early  years,  I  can  distinctly  recollect  the  happy 
influences  exerted  on  my  mind  by  the  general  tone  of  religion  in  this  town.  1 
can  recollect,  too,  a  corruption  of  morals  among  those  of  my  own  age,  which 
made  boyhood  a  critical,  perilous  season.  Still  I  must  bless  God  for  the 
place  of  my  nativity  j  for,  as  my  mind  unfolded,  I  became  more  and  more 
alive  to  the  beautiful  scenery  which  now  attracts  strangers  to  our  island.  My 
first  liberty  was  used  in  roaming  over  the  neighboring  fields  and  shores  ;  and 
amid  this  glorious  nature,  that  love  of  liberty  sprang  up,  which  has  gained 
strength  within  me  to  this  hour.  I  early  received  impressions  of  the  great 
and  the  beautiful,  which  I  believe  have  had  no  small  influence  in. determining 
my  modes  of  thought  and  habits  of  life.  In  this  town  I  pursued  for  a  time 
my  studies  of  theology.  I  had  no  professor  or  teacher  to  guide  me ;  but  1 
had  two  noble  places  of  study.  One  was  yonder  beautiful  edifice,  now  so 
frequented  and  so  useful  as  a  public  library,  then  so  deserted  that  I  spent  day 
after  day,  and  sometimes  week  after  week  amidst  its  dusty  volumes,  without 
interruption  from  a  single  visitor.  The  other  place  was  yonder  beach,  the 
roar  of  which  has  so  often  mingled  with  the  worship  of  this  place,  my  daily 
resort,  dear  to  me  in  the  sunshine,  still  more  attractive  in  the  storm.  Seldom 
do  I  visit  it  now  without  thinking  of  the  work  which  there,  in  the  sight  of  that 
beauty,  in  the  sound  of  those  waves,  was  carried  to  my  soul.  No  spot  on 
earth  has  helped  to  form  me  so  much  as  that  beach.  There  I  lifted  up  my 
voice  in  praise  amidst  the  tempest.  There,  softened  by  beauty,  I  poured  out 
my  thanksgiving  and  contrite  confessions.  There,  in  reverential  sympathy 
with  the  mighty  power  around  me,  I  became  conscious  of  power  within. 
There  struggling  thoughts  and  emotions  broke  forth,  as  if  moved  to  utter- 
ance by  nature's  eloquence  of  the  wind  and  waves.  There  began  a  happi- 
15 


226  HISTORY  OF  THE  REDWOOD  LIBRARY. 

ness  surpassing  all  worldly,  pleasures,  all  gifts  of  fortune — the  happiness  ol 
communing  with  the  works  of  God.  Pardon  me  this  reference  to  myself.  I 
believe  that  the  worship,  of  which  I  have  this  day  spoken,  was  aided  in  my 
own  soul  by  the  scenes  in  which  my  early  life  was  passed.  Amidst  these 
scenes,  and  in  speaking  of  this  worship,  allow  me  to  thank  God  that  this 
beautiful  island  was  the  place  of  my  birth.' 

If  the  Redwood  Library  had  begun  and  ended  its  history,  only  in  fulfilling 
its  gentle  mission  of  inspiration  to  Channing,  it  would  not  have  been  founded 
in  vain  ;  for  from  that  peerless  man,  radiated  a  sublimer  and  sweeter  spirit 
of  Christian  humanity  and  intellectual  refinement,  than  from  almost  any  other 
soul  that  has  breathed  the  air  of  the  New  World. 

It  shared  the  fate  of  so  many  sister  institutions  in  the  ravages  of  the 
Revolution  ;  the  British  troops,  at  their  departure,  carrying  off  so  many  of  the 
finest  works,  it  was  for  a  long  time  afterwards  greatly  shorn  of  its  usefulness. 
In  1834,  the  shareholders  did  something  to  'popularize  the  library,'  by  having 
lectures  delivered,  and  the  number  of  volumes  and  journals  increased.  On 
its  hundredth  anniversary  something  further  was  done.  But  it  was  not  till 
1854-5,  that  the  spell  of  the  old  traditional  belief  that  the  founder  of  the 
library  had  limited  the  number  of  members  to  one  hundred,  was  broken. 
Fifty  new  shares  were  bought,  and  by  1857  a  fund  of  $10,000  was  thus  secured. 
The  building  was  enlarged,  without  impairing  its  design,  chiefly  to  make  room 
for  flie  collection  of  paintings  of  the  artist  Charles  B.  King,  a  native  of  New- 
port, who  presented  eighty-six  pictures  ;  and  at  his  death,  in  1862,  bequeathed 
the  remainder  of  his  gallery,  together  with  many  rare  books  on  art,  and  pro- 
perty amounting  to  $10,000.  Dr.  William  J.  Walker  has  also  recently  made 
a  bequest  of  the  same  amount,  and  $20,000  more  have  been  raised  by  a  sub- 
scription, of  which  Mr.  George  H.  Gibbs  gave  one-half.  The  library  now 
contains  upwards  of  20,000  books  and  3,000  pamphlets.  It  is  the  most 
attractive  spot  in  Newport,  as  Newport  is  the  most  attractive  spot  in  North 
America.  Nor  is  it  believed  that  there  will  hereafter  be  any  difficulty  in 
raising  whatever  sum  of  money  may  be  desired,  for  enlarging,  embellishing, 
and  sustaining  this  noble  institution,  for  it  is  the  resort  and  summer  residence 
of  more  persons  of  taste,  wealth,  and  culture,  than  any  other  spot  on  the  con- 
tinent. A  higher  spirit  and  a  purer  atmosphere  is  breathed  there,  than  in 
any  of  the  watering-places  or  capitals  of  the  United  States. 

The  New  York  Society  Library,  although  not  chartered  till  1754,  it  dates 
its  existence  from  the  beginning  of  that  century,  and  is  therefore,  on  the  score 
of  time,  nominally  the  oldest  institution  of  the  kind  in  the  country.  The 
Library  started  with  a  gift  of  a  number  of  volumes,  '  for  the  use  of  the  public,' 
from  Rev.  John  Sharp,  chaplain  to  the  Earl  of  Ballamont,  governor  of  the 
province.  A  few  of  the  ponderous  tomes  are  still  preserved.  Little  is  known 
of  the  collection  till  1729,  when  Rev.  Dr.  Millington,  of  England,  bequeathed 
his  library  to  The  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel,  by  whom  it  wa9 
presented  to  the  New  York  Library.     The  entire  collection  remained  in  the 


THE  AE  W  YORK  SO  CIE  TV  LIBRAR  Y.  '  227 

hands  of  the  City  Corporation,  who  seem  to  have  been  bad  curators  of  books. 
When  King's  College  was  founded  in  1754,  some  eminent  citizens  associated 
to  form  a  library  'for  the  use  and  ornament  of  the  city,  and  the  advantage 
of  our  intended  College.'  The  body  of  works  was  increased,  and  in  1772 
under  a  new  charter  the  institution  assumed  the  title  it  has  since  borne,  4  The 
New  York  Society  Library.'  Two  years  before  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence the  records  of  the  Society  were  broken  off  for  fourteen  years.  While 
the  British  held  New  York,  '  the  soldiery  were  in  the  habit  of  carrying  of! 
books  in  their  knapsacks,  to  sell  for  grog.'  Little  or  nothing,  Mr.  Duyckinck 
tells  us,  was  left  of  the  collection  at  the  peace,  but  folios  which  either  proved 
too  bulky  for  the  knapsack,  or  too  heavy  for  the  pilferers,  or  were,  perhaps, 
too  dry  for  exchange  for  fluids  on  any  terms  whatever.  In  December,  1788, 
the  shareholders  at  last  bestirred  themselves,  issued  a  call,  came  together, 
elected  officers,  and  in  the  next  year  obtained,  a- renewal  of  their  charter. 

The  room  in  the  Old  City  Hall,  on  the  site  of  the  present  sub-treasury 
building,  corner  of  Nassau  and  Wall  streets,  being  too  small  for  the  growing 
collection,  a  spacious  edifice  was  erected  opposite  the  Middle  Dutch  Church, 
now  the  temporary  post-office,  to  which  it  was  removed  in  1795.  In  1836 
the  library  had  outgrown  its  space,  and  a  new  and  imposing  building  was 
put  up  on  the  corner  of  Leonard  street  and  Broadway.  Again  new  quarters 
were  found  in  the  Bible  House  ;  and  at  last  ground  was  purchased  for  a  per- 
manent home  for  the  migratory  library,  near  the  corner  of  Thirteenth  street 
in  University  Place,  where  a  chaste,  substantial,  and  well  designed  edifice  was 
erected  in  18 — .  From  25,000  volumes,  in  1838,  the  number  rose  to  35,000, 
in  1850,  and  it  now — 1874, — exceeds  65,000.  The  original  price  of  shares 
was  fixed  at  five  pounds  perpetual,  subject  to  an  annual  payment  of  ten  shil- 
lings. The  present  price  is  $150,  with  annual  dues  commuted ;  or  $25,  sub- 
ject to  the  annual  payment  of  $10.  The  number  of  members  is  now  one 
thousand.  John  Forbes  filled  the  office  of  Librarian  from  1794  to  1824,  and 
was  succeeded  by  his  son  Philip  J.  Forbes,  '  to  whom,'  Mr.  Duyckink  well 
says,  '  the  institution  is  under  obligations  for  his  long  services  as  a  faithful 
curator  of  its  possessions,  and  a  judicious  co-operator  with  the  trustees  for 
their  increase.'  His  resignation  rendered  it  a  far  less  attractive  spot  for  the 
stranger,  and,  above  all,  the  scholar,  to  visit. 

While  the  early  sessions  of  Congress  were  held  in  New  York,  the  City  Li- 
brary formed  the  Library  of  Congress.  Its  collection  includes  valuable  files 
of  the  periodical  literature  of  this  century.  Among  its  ancient  and  curious 
volumes,  is  the  collection  of  early  theological  and  scientific  works,  chiefly  in 
Latin,  which  belonged  to  John  Winthrop,  the  first  governor  of  Connecticut, 
— presented  in  181 2  by  his  descendant  Francis  B.  Winthrop,  Esq. 

The  Charleston  Library. — Having  spoken  of  three  of  the  oldest  public  library 
associations  of  the  country,  disconnected  with  colleges,  some  honorable  men- 
tion is  due  to  the  fourth.  In  1748,  an  association  of  seventeen  young  men  in 
Charleston,  raised  a  small  fund  to  '  collect  new  pamphlets  and  magazines  pub 


228    CHARLESTON  LIBRARY.     DAWN  OF  THE  REVOLUTION. 

lished  in  Great  Britain.'  In  two  years  their  numbers  increased  to  160.  In 
1755,  they  obtained  a  charter,  and  not  many  years  later  the  eminent  lawyer, 
John  McKenzie  of  that  city,  left  his  valuable  library  to  the  association,  and 
the  vested  funds,  exclusive  of  the  sums  expended  in  books,  amounted  in 
1778,  to  twenty  thousand  pounds.  But  the  whole  was  whelmed  in  the  desola- 
tion of  fire  on  the  15th  of  the  following  January — only  185  volumes  out  of  6000 
being  preserved,  with  about  two-thirds  of  the  McKenzie  collection.  When 
peace  came,  the  ashes  of  the  old  institution  presented  a  spectacle  too  sad  not 
to  excite  the  pride  of  its  people,  as  well  as  the  grief  of  the  stranger.  In  1 792  a 
new  collection  was  commenced,  which  in  a  few  years  amounted  to  5,000  vol- 
umes.* In  1 85 1  the  number  had  been  raised  to  20,000;  while  the  building 
originally  known  as  the  Bank  of  South  Carolina,  had  been  purchased  in  1840. 

Nothing  but  prosperity  and  usefulness  marked  the  institution  till  another 
desolation,  in  the  concentrated  form  of  famine  and  pestilence  and  the  violence 
of  the  sword  fell  upon  the  devoted  city,  when  some  kind  hands  watched  the 
collection,  and  bore  it  off  to  Columbia,  placing  it  in  the  college  building, 
which  being  used  for  a  hospital,  sheltered  these  sibylline  leaves  of  learning. 
They  were  at  least  sacred  in  the  atmosphere  of  pestilence. 

The  collection  did  not,  however,  remain  entire ;  all  the  books  left  in  Charles- 
ton were  stolen  or  destroyed,  and  the  library  structure  was  damaged.  But 
when  peace  came  once  more — and  God  send  that  this  time  her  mission  may 
never  cease, — in  1866,  it  found  itself  possessed  of  15,000  volumes,  but 
without  funds  to  replace  the  losses.  The  society  was  reorganized.  Efforts, 
however,  that  have  since  been  made,  have  not  been  entirely  unsuccessful ;  and 
since  some  of  the  curses  which  that  dreadful  war  brought  with  it,  and  left,  as 
a  cruel  legacy  to  the  innocent,  have  been  mitigated,  it  is  believed  that  there  are 
good  men  and  true,  enough  in  this  redeemed  land,  who,  while  they  are  them- 
selves indulging  in  the  luxuries  of  accumulated  wealth,  are  not  insensible  to 
the  benedictions  of  learning ;  and  who  now  and  then  may  cast  a  look  of  com- 
passion towards  that  desolated  temple  of  science,  whose  torch  was  so  cruelly 
extinguished  by  the  demon  of  war. 


SECTION  SEVENTH. 

THE    DAWN  OF  THE  REVOLUTION — TOKENS    OF    ITS    APPROACH — CAUSES   WHICH 
IMMEDIATELY    LED   TO   THE    DECLARATION    OF    INDEPENDENCE. 

I  have  made  this  Introductory  Period  as  brief  as  I  could.  It  was  necessary 
to  prepare  the  back-ground,  before  I  began  to  delineate  Our  First  Hundred 
Years. 

In  bringing  this  part  to  a  close,  we  must  briefly  glance  at  the  Stamp  Act 
Congress,  the  increased  aggressions  of  the  Imperial  Government,  the  progress 
of  the  national  cause  throughout  the  country,  the  growing  spirit  of  union,  the 
meeting  of  the  First  Legislative  Continental  Congress  at  Carpenters'  Hall, 


PROFOUND  LOYALTY  OF  THE  COLONISTS.  22  j 

and   the   first   battles   in  Massachusetts   which   opened  the    drama   of  the 
Revolution,  and  brought  about  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 

So  great  was  the  affection  of  the  colonists  for  the  parent  country  j  so  deep 
their  confidence  in  the  strong  arm  of  England,  then  becoming  the  foremost, 
and  to  the  colonists  the  dearest  of  all  nations ;  and  so  well  satisfied  were  they 
with  their  wild  and  almost  unfettered  freedom,  it  required  a  series  of  powerful 
causes  to  bring  about  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  The  loyalty  of  the 
colonists  was  a  profound  and  earnest  sentiment.  It  colored  all  their  actions ; 
it  inspired  all  their  legislation ;  it  was  the  spirit  which  breathed  all  through 
their  social  life.  These  colonies  were  too  securely  moored  to  the  British 
throne  to  be  wrenched  away  by  a  single  shock ;  and  they  were  severed  at 
last,  only  by  a  series  of  galling  insults,  and  unmixed  wrongs,  never  attempted 
before  in  time  of  peace,  by  a  great  empire  upon  a  brave,  free,  and  loyal  peo- 
ple. When  such  words  as  James  Otis  and  Patrick  Henry  uttered,  fell  upon 
the  ears  of  good  and  patriotic,  but  less  prophetic  men,  they  sent  a  shudder 
along  every  nerve.  Not  a  statesman  in  the  country  but  agreed  with  the 
patriot  Hopkins  of  Rhode  Island — who  had  with  his  own  hand  written  a  de- 
claration which  was  published  by  authority  of  the  Plantations — that  i  the  glo- 
rious constitution  of  Great  Britain  is  the  best  that  ever  existed  among  men.' 
This  was  the  universal  feeling.  The  inviolability  of  English  freedom,  and  the 
justice  of  the  British  Parliament,  were  statutes  in  every  heart.  Even  James 
Otis,  when  he  had  declared  that  '  the  people  looked  upon  their  liberties  as 
gone,'  often  gave  way  to  paroxysms  of  grief.  *  Tears,'  he  said,  ■  relieve  me  for 
a  moment,  and  I  indignantly  repel  the  imputation  that  the  continent  of  Ame- 
rica is  about  to  become  insurgent.  It  is  the  duty  of  all,  humbly  and  silently, 
to  acquiesce  in  all  the  decisions  of  the  supreme  Legislature.  Nine  hundred  and 
ninety-nine  in  a  thousand  of  the  colonists,  will  never  once  entertain  a  thought 
but  of  submission  to  our  sovereign,  and  to  the  authority  of  Parliament  in  all 
possible  contingencies.  They  undoubtedly  have  the  right  to  levy  internal 
taxes  on  the  colonies.  From  my  soul  I  detest  and  abhor  the  thought  of  mak- 
ing the  question  of  jurisdiction.' 

Time  and  again,  Otis  had  declared  in  public,  and  to  correspondents  in  Eng- 
land, that ■  nothing  but  the  most  unparental  conduct,  nothing  but  the  grossest 
injustice  and  cruelty,  would  drive  the  colonies  into  rebellion.' 

The  idea  of  a  Declaration  of  Independence  dawned  slowly  upon  the  Ame- 
rican mind.  Nine  years  had  to  go  by  after  the  Stamp  Act  Congress  had 
used  such  bold  and  almost  defiant  language  to  the  British  crown,  before  the 
quiet  village  of  Lexington  was  disturbed  by  the  first  musket  shot  levelled 
against  the  breast  of  a  British  soldier.  Hunted  down  like  forest  beasts,  they 
turned  at  bay  only  at  the  last  moment ;  and  even  then  it  was  with  the  deepest 
reluctance  that  they  took  up  arms  against  the  King  of  England.  From  the 
beginning  to  the  close  of  the  struggle,  we  trace  at  every  step  a  conscious  grief 
in  every  blow  the  colonists  dealt.     And  we  find  an  illustration,  during  that  ter. 


23°      AFFECTION  OF  OUR  FOREFATHERS  FOR  ENGLAND. 

rible  period,  of  what  so  few  wars  have  offered, — hesitation- on  the  part  of  th« 
defenders  in  unsheathing  the  sword,  humanity  in  every  moment  of  victory,  and 
magnanimity  to  every  fallen  foe. 

The  proofs  of  the  loyalty  of  the  colonists  are  scattered  throughout  their  his- 
tory. There  was  not  an  American  home  in  which  the  brilliant  records  of 
England's  achievements  were  not  read  with  pride.  At  all  periods  the  people 
were  ready  to  make  common  cause  with  England  in  the  defense  and  spread 
of  her  empire.  We  have  given  some  proofs  of  the  loyalty  with  which  our 
fathers  rallied  round  the  standard  of  England  when  it  was  carried  across  the 
St.  Lawrence,  with  the  avowed  purpose  of  Pitt,  '  to  sweep  the  lilies  of  France 
from  North  America.'  The  commonest  readers  of  the  records  of  those  times, 
are  familiar  with  the  heroism  of  the  colonists,  which  on  all  sides  called  forth 
praises  from  the  old  British  commanders.  I  have  shown  how  in  that  war  the 
bravest  soldiers  and  most  skilful  generals  of  the  .Revolution  were  trained. 
Washington  himself  gained  in  his  two  Western  campaigns,  the  reputation 
which  insured  for  him  the  leadership  of  the  Revolutionary  armies. 

None  but  the  obtuse  and  unthinking  forget,  that,  up  to  the  time  of  the  em- 
barkation of  our  fathers,  England  was  their  country,  and  that  our  ancestral  his- 
tory was  the  history  of  Britain.  The  great  writers  of  England,  till  the  period  of 
the  Commonwealth,  wrote  and  thought  for  our  fathers,  as  much  as  for  the  fathers 
of  any  Englishman  of  to-day ;  and  we  have  as  many  associations  to  bind  us  tc 
them  and  their  times,  as  if  we  had  been  born  on  that  wonderful  island. 

Around  English  history  there  is  a  charm  which  can  be  found  in  no  other. 
The  recent  and  the  remote ;  the  plain  and  the  obscure ;  novelty  springing 
up  by  the  gray  remains  of  antiquity  ;  and  all  the  elements  of  the  touching  and 
the  beautiful,  the  gloomy  and  the  grand,  mingle  with  the  chronicles  of  the 
fatherland,  which  are  found  in  all  our  libraries. 

It  is  true,  we  read  with  pride  and  emotion  of  our  fathers'  struggles,  when 
the  story  leads  us  through  the  toils  of  the  Revolution  back  to  the  Indian- 
haunted  shores  of  the  James  river,  to  the  gloom  of  the  green  old  forests  in  the 
far  west,  and  the  desolation  of  Plymouth  landing.  But  there  the  story  ceases 
in  America,  and  must  cross  the  water  for  an  account  of  our  antecedent 
national  existence.  We,  personally,  then,  have  an  interest  in  whatever  con 
cerns  England,  and  feeling  much  as  our  forefathers  did,  we  can  betimes  forge* 
America,  as  it  slumbered  on,  unwaked  by  the  sea-gun  of  Columbus,  while  we 
retrace  the  glory  of  our  ancestors  through  succeeding  generations,  to  the  time 
when  the  Roman  Conqueror  first  planted  the  eagle  of  Italy  on  the  rocks  of 
Britain,  and  returned  to  tell  of  a  stormy  island  in  the  Northern  Ocean,  and  of 
the  rugged  barbarians  who  dwelt  in  its  glens,  and  hunted  on  its  cliffs. 

Proud,  then,  of  their  English  descent ;  having  fought  and  bled  for  the 
cause  of  the  home  empire ;  every  house  filled  with  trophies  of  victory,  and 
every  heart  with  tender  and  inspiring  souvenirs,  we  may  well  understand  how 
deep  was  the  loyalty  of  the  colonists  to  the  crown.  It  was  the  very  excess  of 
loyalty  which  tolerated  insults  and  grievances  till  they  could  be  borne  no 


BOW  ENGLAND  ALIENATED  HER  COLONIES.  231 

longer.  It  was  the  very  excess  of  loyalty  which  clouded  the  whole  country 
with  gloom  and  affliction,  when  the  final  rupture  became  inevitable.  As  ? 
natural  consequence,  when  this  gave  way  to  the  assertion  of  national  sov 
ereignty,  the  struggle  was  prosecuted  with  unparalleled  ardor  and  perseve- 
rance. Any  war  forced  upon  a  magnanimous  people  in  such  circumstances, 
must  be  unrelenting.  That  the  victorious  colonists  should,  on  any,  much  less 
on  nearly  all  occasions,  have  displayed,  in  the  fine  language  of  Phillips,  '  a 
magnanimity  which  gave  new  grace  to  victory,'  may  have  well  challenged  the 
admiration  of  the  Irish  orator. 

England  could  have  enforced,  and  she  did,  upon  her  subjects  in  other 
parts  of  the  world,  laws  more  oppressive.  Witness  India,  whose  scores  of 
millions  of  prostrate  people  she  has  robbed  for  thirty  decades.  Witness  cen- 
turies of  injustice,  which,  until  within  two  or  three  years,  forced,  among  other 
acts  of  grinding  oppression,  an  alien  church  upon  an  alien  people — a  disgrace 
from  which  England's  name  has  at  last  been  redeemed  by  Gladstone,  the 
greatest  of  all  her  modern  statesmen.  Witness  the  number  of  her  own  home 
people,  who  have  submitted  to  class  legislation  for  ages — a  legislation  based 
substantially  upon  the  luxury  of  the  few,  at  the  expense  of  the  poverty  of 
many, — a  system  which  dressed  one  man  in  gold,  and  sent  him  to  the  House 
of  Lords,  and  a  thousand  others  in  rags,  and  sent  them  to  the  workhouse. 
True,  indeed,  governments  in  every  period  of  the  world,  and  enlightened 
governments,  so  called,  had  successfully  enforced  on  tributary  dependencies, 
the  same  policy  that  English  politicians  laid  down  for  America.  But  this 
policy  has  never  been  successful  when  attempted  upon  a  community  like  the 
Scotch,  intelligent  as  well  as  brave ;  nor  upon  the  Swiss,  or  the  Tyrolese,  in 
their  mountain  fastnesses.  Nor  could  it  do  here.  The  spirit  of  independence 
among  the  early  colonists,  grew  naturally  out  of  their  exposed  and  unpro- 
tected position,  which  gave  birth  to  their  high  character  for  braving  danger 
and  enduring  privation — characteristics  which  inherently  pertain  to  men  who 
cut  themselves  adrift  from  all  reliances  on  ancient  scenes  of  civilization,  and 
look  forward  to  a  continent  where  they  are  to  build  up  a  fairer  and  stronger 
structure  of  civil  life.  Among  a  like  number  of  men,  history  does  not  show 
so  many  examples,  in  both  sexes,  and  among  the  young  and  the  old,  of  calm 
self-reliance  in  the  midst  of  danger  j  of  clear  perceptions  of  the  value  and 
the  cost  of  liberty,  of  the  pricelessness  of  knowledge,  or  of  unshaken  con- 
fidence in  the  justice  and  the  love  of  God.  The  experience  which  America 
has  had,  with  the  inspirations  of  her  great  traditions,  ought  to  make  her  the 
most  reverent,  the  most  humble,  the  most  philosophical,  and  intelligently 
pious  of  all  nations. 

The  most  casual  recurrence  to  the  social  history  of  the  American  colon- 
ists,  will  show  that  the  religious  sentiment  suffused  the  whole  body  of  society. 
*  Since  the  inauguration  of  the  theocratic  government  over  the  Jewish  nation,' 
said  Merle  d' Aubigne  '  to  me,  '  it  really  seems,  in  looking  carefully  into  history, 

1  I  cannot  mention  the  name  of  this  pure  and  great  road  days,  the  distance  of  400  miles  was  an  easy  rida 
man  without  some  expression  of  veneration  and  love,  from  his  home  m  Geneva  to  ours  in  Genoa— he  would 
Residing  in  Switzerland — where  even  before  the  rail-      sometimes  leave  the  severe  labors  of  his  pulpit,  his  pro* 


232     MERLE  UAUBIGN&S  VIEW  OF  AMERICAN  CHARACTER. 

that  there  has  been  no  instance  except  that  of  America,  of  an  approach  of 
the  Creator  so  visible  into  the  immediate  control  of  human  affairs — no  case 
so  palpable  to  the  comprehension  of  everybody  who  will  both  read  and  think, 
as  we  find  in  the  annals  of  the  Puritans  of  New  England,  the  Dutch  of  New 
York,  the  free  Catholics  of  Maryland,  the  Quakers  of  Pennsylvania,  the  Cava- 
liers of  Virginia,    and  the  Huguenots  of  Carolina.     With  these  apparently 
heterogeneous  elements,  there  has  not  been,  since  the  establishment  of  the 
elder  nations  of  the  earth,  if  even  then,  an  instance  so  striking,  of  the  rapid 
formation  of  a  national  character, — least  of  all  on  so  grand  a  scale.      I  am 
aware,'  he  continued,  '  that  a  national  character  was  for  a  long  time  denied  to 
you,  as  in  the  slang  of  unfriendly  European  criticism,  you  have  been  even 
denied  a  national  literature.     Whereas  the  truth  is,  if  literature  consists  in  the 
published  products  of  the  human  mind  enlarged  by  study,  and  enlightened  by 
experiences  new  to  mankind ;  in  the  advancement  made  in  religion,  meta- 
physics and  science ;  in   the  art  of  government ;   in  codes  of  law  and  juris- 
prudence ;  in  systems  of  education  ;  in  the  economy  of  prisons  ;  in  missions  to 
heathen  nations,  and  in  rich  contributions  to  learning  and  language — if  all  this 
does  not  mean  a  national  literature  sui  generis,  and  sublime,  what  does?     It 
required  two  thousand  years  in  England,  France,  or  Germany,  to  stamp  charac- 
teristic nationality,  in  any  of  these  respects,  upon  all  their  people.     Nor  is  the 
work  complete  in  any  of  the  European  nations.     Italy  has  been  divided  into 
rival  principalities  and  factions,  ever  since  the  fall  of  Rome.     France  had  no 
nationality  until  the  downfall  of  feudalism.     Even  to  this  hour,  nothing  but 
force  makes  Ireland,  in  any  sense,  a  part  of  the  British  empire.     It  was  not 
until  Frederick  the  Great,  T;hat  even  Prussia  became  a  nation ;  and  the  Ger- 
manic world  is  but  a  cluster  of  rival  nations  now.1     Russia  binds  sixty  millions 
of  people  into  an  imperial  unit ;  but  it  is  only  the  enforced  union  of  a  hun- 
dred subject  tribes.     Spain,  from  her  geographical  position,  has  had  some- 
thing resembling  unity ;  but  steeped  in  the  torpor  of  superstition,  there  has 
been  no  religious  or  political  freedom — none  of  thought,  at  any  time,  through- 
out that  broad  peninsula:     The  great  Gustavus  did  breathe  a  homogeneous 
spirit  into  Sweden,  which  blended  her  handful  of  freedom-loving  people  into  a 
single  community.     But  to  me,  the  standing  miracle  of  history  is  this  blending 
of  your  Thirteen  Colonies  first,  and    afterwards  all    your  States,  into  one 
Nation.     I  sometimes  try  to  account  for  it  by  remembering  that  every  man 
who  went  to  your  continent,  unmoored  himself  from  the  Old  World  ;  that  his 
interests  had  already  been  transferred  to  the  new  soil,  before  he  stepped  on 
it.     In   the  annals  of  North  American  colonization,    in   broad    distinction 
from  that  of  Spain,  and  France,  and  Portugal,  I  find  few  instances  of  men  em 
barking  for  the  western  coast, — after  colonization  had  got  under  way, — 

fessorship,  and  above  all  his  exhaustive  work  on  the  which  he  was  dwelling  upon  the  connection  between 

Reformation,  and  '  regale  himself,'  as  he  used  to  say,  free  institutions  and   the  development  of  an  enlight- 

'  in   the  luxury  of  American  society,  American  books,  ened    religious   sentiment,    he  gave  utterance   to  the 

and  American  thoughts,'  all  under  the  bright  skies,  and  words  I  have  quoted  in  the  text. 

in  the  most  soothing  air  of  Italy.     During  one  of  these 

visits,  in  1844,  while  he  was   taking  sciie  notes  one  1  The  reader  will  remember  that  this  conversation 

morning  in  my  library,  for  a  chapter  of  his  History,  in  occurred  thirty  years  ago. 


TRIBUTE  TO  MERLE  UAUBIGN&  AND  COUNT  CAVOUR.  233 

without  a  full  expectation  of  meeting  difficulties,  and  enduring  sufferings. 
Besides,  no  nation,  not  excepting  the  Phoenicians,  the  Greeks,  or  Romans, 
ever  had  such  noble  founders.  Those  nations  have  all  had  impressive  and 
grand  histories,  and  in  their  times  achieved  about  all  that  was  done  for  the 
human  race.  But  the  establishment  of  civilized  life  and  organic  forms  of 
government,  under  the  inspirations  of  a  pure  and  free  Christianity,  and  guided 
by  men  of  ripe  learning,  and  unparalleled  patriotism,  was  a  scene  your  conti- 
nent alone  has  presented.  All  the  comprehending  minds  of  Europe — and 
these  were  many — understood  this  ;  especially  Berkeley.  I  am  always  struck 
with  that  line  :  Westward  the  course  of  e?npire  takes  its  way.  His  prophetic 
eye,  and  humane  heart,  saw  and  felt  the  glory  of  your  future  so  clearly,  and 
he  exulted  in  it  so  warmly,  forty  years  before  the  signers  of  the  Declaration 
of  Independence  came  together  ! ' 

.  I  am  not  sorry  to  pay  this  tribute  to  the  illustrious  and  learned  Switzer. 
Of  all  the  noble  Europeans  I  had  for  many  years  such  favorable  opportunities 
to  know — and  to  whom  I  am  always  glad  to  show  my  gratitude  for  the  kind- 
ness and  patience  they  displayed  toward  so  unworthy  a  pupil — I  found  no  one 
who  so  thoroughly  comprehended  American  character,  and  history,  as  Merle 
D'Aubigne.  De  Tocqueville  surpassed  all  other  Europeans,  perhaps,  in  a 
keen  and  discriminating  analysis  of  the  philosophy  of  our  system  of  govern- 
ment. His  '  Democracy  in  America'  read  like  prophecy  thirty-five  years  ago  ; 
it  reads  like  history  now.  But  his  great  Dissertation  was  limited  to  the  theory 
of  our  political  system.  With  all  his  facilities  for  studying  American  charac- 
ter on  the  spot,  he  neither  comprehended  it  as  well,  nor'was  he  so  familiar 
with  our  colonial  history,  as  D'Aubigne.  In  truth,  the  whole  subject  of  Amer- 
ica, its  institutions,  and  the  character  of  the  people  has,  till  within  recent 
years,  been  a  sealed  book  to  most  Europeans ;  while  the  ignorance  which 
still  prevails  among  even  the  learned  men  and  statesmen  of  the  Old  World  on 
government  and  society  in  the  United  States^  is  as  amazing  as  it  is  lament- 
able. ' 

But  I  hear  the  old  bell  ringing  on  the  morning  of  the  Fourth  of  July,  1776, 
from  the  Hall  of  Independence,  and  I  must  leave  these  calm  thoughts,  and 
tranquil  scenes  which  have  beguiled  me  too  long,  for  the  tragedy  on  which 
the  curtain  must  now  be  lifted. 

I  shall  attempt  no  detailed  account  of  the  events  which  transpired  during 
the  few  years  that  preceded  the  Revolution.  The  traveller  makes  no  minute 
observations  of  the  shores  of  the  river  down  which  he  is  floating,  while  he  is 
straining  his  ear  to  catch  the  roar  of  the  cataract.  The  first  clear  note  of  the 
fatal  plunge  of  British  statesmanship,  which  was  to  end  in  the  separation  of 
the  Colonies  from  the  throne  of  England,  was  now  to  be  sounded. 

1  I  should  perhaps  make  another  exception,  and  it  rection  of  Italy  from  the  tomb  of  ages,  and  the  consoli- 

would  be  in  favor  of  Count  Cavouk,  under  whose  illu-  dation  of  all  the  emancipated  states  of  the  Peninsula 

minated  statesmanship  the  kingdom  of  Sardinia  led  the  into    the   splendid  kingdom  so  ably  ruled  by  Victor 

wsty  in  the  great  movement  which  ended  in  the  resur-  Emanuel. 


234  PASSAGE  OF  THE  STAMP  ACT. 

Passage  of  the  Stamp  Act,  March  8,  1765. — In  1764  Lord  Granville  gav« 
notice  to  the  American  agents  in  London  of  his  intention  to  lay  a  tax  on  the 
Colonies,  and  that  with  the  next  session  of  Parliament  he  should  begin  by 
imposing  a  stamp  duty;  and  on  the  8th  of  the  following  March  the  Stamp 
Act  became  a  law.  It  was  passed  against  the  most  earnest  entreaties,  the 
firmest  protests,  and  the  solemn  warnings  of  Benjamin  Franklin,  and  all  the 
other  colonial  agents  in  London.  The  eloquence  and  statesmanship  of  Parlia- 
ment were  arrayed  against  it.  Every  American  schoolboy  has  learned  by  heart 
the  speeches  of  Pitt,  Conway,  Barre,  and  their  brave  colleagues,  who,  like 
Leonidas  and  his  Greeks,  fought  that  desperate  and  almost  hopeless  battle  in 
behalf  the  rights  of  civil  liberty.  If  eloquence,  such  as  had,  perhaps,  never 
before  been  heard  in  St.  Stephen's,  could  have  averted  that  fatal  act,  it  would 
have  never  passed.  If,  in  the  history  of  despotism,  the  old  adage,  that 
*  Whom  the  gods  wish  to  destroy  they  first  make  mad,'  were  ever  true,  it  was 
true  then.  The  ministry  and  their  majority  in  the  House  of  Commons  closed 
their  ears  against  every  argument,  and  rushed  madly  to  their  fate.1  Lord 
Granville  had  requested  the  American  agents  to  give  notice  to  the  Colonies 
of  his  intention.  He  might  have  spared  himself  the  trouble,  for  these  Argus- 
eyed  representatives  would  be  sure  to  make  the  news  ring  through  America 
quite  soon  enough. 

Franklin's  Message  to  his  Countrymen. — While  the  debate  on  the  Stamp 
Act  was  drawing  to  a  close,  and  its  passage  had  become  certain,  Franklin — - 
who  had  watched  every  sign  with  the  keenest  sagacity,  himself  the  most  anx- 
ious of  all  the  spectators,  since  he  foresaw  more  clearly  than  all  what  momen- 
tous issues  were  at  stake — wrote  to  his  friend,  Charles  Thomson,  these  words  : 
1  The  sun  of  liberty  has  set.  You  must  light  up  the  candles  of  industry  and 
economy.'  The  following  reply  flashed  back  from  the  burning  soul  of  Thom- 
son :  'Be  assured  we  shall  light  up  torches  of  quite  another  sort'  He  spoke 
the  feelings  of  his  countrymen*;  for  when  the  news  of  the  passage  of  the 
Stamp  Act.  reached  America,  it  kindled  a  flame  of  anger  from  one  end  of  the 
country  to  the  other.     The  whole  body  of  the  American  people  were  nerved 

1  The  policy  was   inaugurated  under  various  pre-  actions,  and  to  prey  upon  them  ;  whose  behavior,  op 

texts,  and  with  many  plausible  words  ;  but  there  was  many  occasions,  has  caused  the  blood  of  those  sons  of 

a  man  in  the  House  of  Commons  whose  loyal  and  mag-  liberty  to   recoil  within   them  ;    men    promoted  to  the 

nanimous  soul  revolted   against  so  base  a  return  for  highest  seats  of  justice,   some  of  whom  were  glad,  by 

American  loyalty ;  and  fired  with  the  eloquence  of  in-  going  to  a  foreign  country,  to  escape  being  brought 

dignation,  Col.  Barr6  thus  replied  to  the  speeches  of  to  the  bar  of  justice  in  their  own. 

the  ministers  ; —  «  They  protected  by  your  arms  !     They  have  nobly 

'Children  planted  by  your  care?  No.  Your  op-  taken  up  arms  in  your  defence.  They  have  exerted 
pressions  planted  them  in  America.  They  fled  from  their  valor,  amidst  their  constant  and  laborious  indus- 
your  tyranny  into  a  then  uncultivated  land,  where  they  try,  for  the  defence  of  a  country  which,  while  its  fron- 
were  exposed  to  all  the  hardships  to  which  human  na-  tier  was  drenched  in  blood,  has  yielded  all  its  little 
ture  is  liable  ;  and  among  others,  to  the  cruelties  of  a  savings  to  your  emolument.  Believe  me,  and  remem- 
savage  foe,  the  most  subtle,  and  I  will  take  upon  me  ber  I  have  this  day  told  you  so,  the  same  spirit  which 
to  say,  the  most  terrible,  that  ever  inhabited  any  part  actuated  that  people  at  first,  still  continues  with  them  ; 
of  God's  earth.  And  yet,  actuated  by  principles  of  but  prudence  forbids  me  to  explain  myself  further, 
true  English  liberty,  they  met  all  these  hardships  with  '  God  knows  I  do  not  at  this  time  speak  from  party 
pleasure,  when  they  compared  them  with  those  they  heat.  However  superior  to  me  in  general  knowledge 
suffered  in  their  own  country,  from  men  who  should  and  experience  any  one  here  may  be,  I  claim  to  know 
have  been  their  friends.  more  of  America,  having  been  conversant  in  that  coun 
They  nourished  by  your  indulgence  !  No.  They  try.  The  people  there  are  as  truly  loyal  as  any  sub- 
grew  by  your  neglect.  When  you  began  to  care  about  jects  the  king  has  ;  but  a  people  jealous  of  their  liber- 
them,  that  care  was  exercisad  in  sending  persons  to  ties,  and  will  vindicate  them  if  they  should  be  violated 
rule  over  them,  who  were  deputies  to  some  deputy  But  the  subject  is  delicate  ;  I  will  say  no  more.' 
Bent  to   spy   out  their   liberty,   to  misrepresent  their 


THE  COLONIES  GO  INTO  MOURNING.  235 

by  a  settled  purpose  of  resistance.  By  his  irresistible  eloquence,  Patrick 
Henry  had  swept  Virginia  into  the  tempest  of  a  revolution.  Rutledge  and 
Gadsden  had  lifted  the  oriflamme  of  freedom  in  distant  South  Carolina.  New 
York,  through  her  greatest  son,  Robert  R.  Livingston,  was  committed  to  tht 
policy  of  resistance ;  while  Massachusetts  was  firm,  as  her  own  Plymouth 
Rock,  in  her  early-declared  purposes  to  stand  by  James  Otis,  her  beloved 
leader.  In  her  comprehensive  statesmanship,  which  has  always  been  broad 
and  magnanimous,  measures  of  the  utmost  importance  were  at  once  adopted. 
Not  satisfied  with  bold  declarations  that  she  would  not  yield  to  the  tyranny 
of  the  Stamp  Act,  she  sent  Circular  Letters  through  the  country,  calling  upon 
every  Colony  to  appoint  deputies  to  meet  in  a  General  Congress,  where,  with 
the  concentrated  power  of  federal  union,  the  American  people  might  enter 
into  council,  and  decide  what  they  should  do  in  this  great  public  emergency. 

The  Colonies  go  into  Mourning.— At  last,  as  the  morning  of  the  first  of 
November  broke,  the  day  when  the  Stamp  Act  was  to  be  carried  into  effect, 
the  bells  of  the  churches  from  Massachusetts  to  Georgia  were  tolled  as  if  for 
the  funeral  of  political  liberty,  and  everywhere  signs  of  mourning  appeared. 
In  the  city  of  New  York,  which  has  ever  since  it  passed  under  the  British 
crown,  asserted  its  claim  to  be  the  metropolis  of  the  country,  by  always  re- 
flecting the  public  sentiment  of  the  nation,  men  carried  around  a  Death's 
head  through  the  streets  with  placards  over  it,  ■  Folly  of  England,  and  Ruin 
of  America.'  '  In  Portsmouth,  N.  H.,'  says  Dr.  Holmes,  '  a  coffin  neatly 
ornamented  and  inscribed,  Liberty  aged  clxv.,  was  prepared  for  the  funeral 
procession,  which  began  from  the  court-house,  attended  with  two  unbraced 
drums.  The  minute  guns  were  fired  until  the  corpse  arrived  at  the  grave, 
when  an  oration  was  pronounced  in  honor  of  the  deceased.  Scarcely  was  the 
oration  concluded,  when  some  remains  of  life  having  been  discovered,  the 
corpse  was  taken  up ;  the  inscription  on  the  lid  of  the  coffin  was  changed  to 
Liberty  Revived.  The  bells  struck  a  cheerful  sound,  and  joy  again  appeared 
in  every  countenance.  There  was  not  a  settlement  in  the  Thirteen  Colonies 
where  execration  against  the  King  of  England  did  not  load  the  air  men 
breathed.  Grateful  and  accomplished  women  tore  the  ornaments  of  gold  they 
wore,  from  their  arms  and  necks,  and  casting  them  to  beggars,  said — take 
what  bears  the  royal  stamp,  and  get  your  bread  with  it ;  we  will  not  wear 
them.'  l  The  courts  of  justice,  those  solemn  tribunals,  which  in  all  the  con- 
vulsions through  which  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  has  passed,  have,  since  the 
Magna  Charta,  reflected  the  enlightened  opinion  of  the  best  subjects  and 
the  best  citizens  of  the  state,  adjourned,  closed  their  doors,  and  told  litigants 
to  forget  their  difficulties,  until  a  better  day  should  come  for  the  common 
cause.     Everywhere  men  grasped  each  other's  hands  and  said,  'our  cause  is 

1  On  the  3d  day  of  October,  1765,  the  last  stamp  resignation.     He   announced  his  resignation  with  th« 

officer    north    of    the    Potomac,    the    stubborn    John  words,  'A  man  need  not  be  a  prophet,  nor  the  son  of  a 

Hughes,  a  Quaker  of  Philadelphia,  as  he  lay  desperate-  prophet,  to  see  clearly  that  the  empire  of  Great  Britain 

ly  ill,  heard  muffled-drums  beat  through  the  city,  and  in  North  America  is  at  an  end.' — Bancroft,  voL  v.  p. 

the  State  House  bell  ring  muffled,  and  then  the  tramp-  333. 
tag    feet    of  the  people    assembling   to    demand   his 


236  THE  PROVINCIAL  CONGRESS  OF  1765. 

adjusted,  are  quarrels  are  over;'  whilst  those  who  did  not.  feel  justified  in 
risking  their  complicated  interests  upon  the  hazards  of  a  friendly  settlement, 
consented  to  wait  the  awards  of  arbitration.  In  a  word,  the  Stamp  Act  had 
not  been,  and  could  not  be,  executed  in  America.1 

The  Provincial  Congress  of  1765. — The  Stamp  Act  Congress  assembled 
in  New  York,  October  7th,  1 765.  The  delegates  had  been  elected  by  the 
representatives  of  the  people  of  each  Colony.  Although  they  derived  their 
powers  from  separate  and  independent  sources,  each  Colony  acting  indepen- 
dently for  itself,  yet  they  constituted  one  body,  all  equal  as  delegates,  without 
reference  to  population,  or  the  territory  which  they  represented. 

If  it  was  not  a  numerous,  it  was  an  imposing  assembly,  and  it  was  every- 
where felt  that  upon  their  proceedings  the  fate  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies  was 
suspended.  It  was  composed  of  the  foremost  men  of  the  country.  With 
the  exception  of  some  of  the  wisest  and  best  citizens,  among  whom  was 
Franklin,  then  in  England,  acting  as  agents  of  the  different  colonies,  nearly 
all  the  strongest  men  were  there.  It  was  the  ablest  body  that  could  have  been 
chosen.  Impressed  with  the  greatness  of  the  task  before  them,  they  proceed- 
ed in  a  firm  but  reverent  spirit  to  the  business  before  them.2  They  continued 
in  session  only  fourteen  days ;  but  they  sent  forth  three  papers,  whose  prin- 
ciples and  spirit  could  not  be  mistaken  by  mankind.  The,  first  was  a  Declara- 
tion of  Rights,  written  by  John  Cruger,  of  New  York  ;  the  second,  a  Memo- 
rial to  both  Houses  of  Parliament,  by  Robert  R.  Livingston,  of  New  York  ; 
and  the  third,  a  Petition  to  the  King,  by  James  Otis,  of  Massachusetts. 

1  The  Stamp  Act    was  to  take  effect   the    ist  of  then,  as  it  is  now,  the  political  glory  and  strength  of  the 

November,  1765.     But  before  that  day  came,  oombina-  American  Republic.' 

tions  had  everywhere  been  iormed  against  its  execution.  3  The  Congress  entered  directly  on  the  consideration 

The  feelings  of  the  colonists  were  universally  roused,  of  the  safest  groundwork  on  which  to  rest   the  collec- 

The  bold  had  become  daring ;  the   daring  had  grown  tive  American   liberties.      Should   they  build   on   the 

revolutionary  ;  the  timid  were  prepared  to  join  in  the  charters  or  natural  justice  ;  on  precedents  and  fact  or 

general  movement,  and   even   the  best  friends  of  the  abstract   truth ;    on    special   privileges    or    universal 

king  himself,  and  the  sturdiest  supporters  of  the  royal  reason?    Otis  was  instructed  by  Boston   to   support 

prerogative,     hung    their    heads     in     shame    at    the  not  only  the  liberty  of  the  colonies,  but  also  chartered 

course  of  the  British  Government.  There  was  a  general  rights.     Johnson,  of  Connecticut,   submitted  a  paper 

exclamation  against  the  act,  which  either  exacted  the  which  pleaded  charters  from  the  crown.  But  Robert  R. 

most  humiliating  degradation  that   slavery  knows  how  Livingston,  of  New  York,  the  goodness  of  whose  heart 

to  impose,  or  inflicted  a  penalty  which,  in  the  fine  Ian-  set  him  above  prejudices,  and  equally  comprehended 

guage  of  Mrs.  Willard,  was  '  no  less  than  the  suspension  all  mankind,  would  not  place  the  hope  of  America  on 

of  the  whole  machinery  of  social  order,  and   the  crea-  that  foundation  ;    and    Gadsden  of  South   Carolina, 

tion  of  a  state  of  anarchy.     Neither  trade  nor  naviga-  giving  utterance  to  the  warm  impulses  of  a  brave  and 

tion  could  proceed  ;  no  contract  could  be  legally  made  ;  noble  nature,  spoke  against  it  with  irresistible  impetu- 

110  process  against  an  offender  could  be  instituted;  no  osity.    '  A  confirmation  of  our  essential  and  common 

apprentice  could  be  indented  ;  no  student  could  receive  rights  as   Englishmen,'    thus  he  himself  reports  his 

a  diploma ;  nor  even  could  the  estate  of  the  dead  be  sentiments,    •  may   be    pleaded  from  charters   safely 

legally  settled,  until  the  Stamp  duty  was  paid.  enough  ;  but  any  further  dependence  upon  them  may 

1  Scenes  of  violence  attended  the  attempts  to  enforce  be  fatal.     We  should  stand  upon  the  broad  common 

the  law  ;  and   they  even   preceded  the    period   of  its  ground   of  those  natural  rights  that  we  all  feel   and 

contemplated  enforcement.     In  August,  the  people  of  know  as  men,  and  as  descendants  of  Englishmen.     I 

Boston  burned  Mr.  Andrew  Oliver,  the  king's  officer,  wish    the    charters  may   not  ensnare  us  at  last,   by 

in  effigy,  broke  open  his  house,  and  destroyed  his  furni-  drawing  different  colonies    to  act   differently  in  this 

ture.     They  would  have  gone  further  ;  but  he  pledged  great  cause.     Whenever  that  is   the  case,   all  will  ba 

his  honor  that  he  never  would  attempt  to  execute  the  over  with  the  whole.    There  ought  to  be  no  New  Eng- 

law.     The  furniture,  pictures,    plate,  and   treasure  of  land  men,  no  New  Yorker,  known  on   the.  continent, 

Lieutenant-Governor  Hutchinson  fell  into  the  hands  of  but  all  of  us  Americans.' 

the  mob.     Mr.  Ingersoll,  of  New  Haven,  was  violently  These  views  prevailed  ;  and  in  the  proceedings  of 

brought  before  the  public,  and  compelled   to  give  his  the  Congress  the  argument  of  American  liberty  from 

pledge  that  he  never  would   distribute  a   Stamp.     So,  royal  grants  was  avoided.     This  is  the  first  great 

too,  in  other  places,  the  people  took  the  law  into  their  step  towards  independence.     Dummer  had   pleaded 

own  hands,   every  man    being  prepared    to    make    a  for  colony  charters ;    Livingston,    Gadsden,  and   th« 

declaration  of  independence  for  himself.     In  this  way  Congress  of  1765  provided  for  Americans  self-existence 

we  trace,  many  years  before  the   Declaration  of  In-  and  union  by  claiming  rights  that  preceded  chartarl 

dependence  in   Philadelphia,  the  germinal  principles  and  would  survive  their  ruin. — Bancroft,   vol.  v.   p 

that  gave  origin  to  the  Great  Federal  System   of  con-  335. 
stitutional  liberty  that  became  the  political  watchword 


FRANKLIN  AT  THE  BAR  OF  THE  COMMONS.  237 

The  action  of  the  Congress  electrified  the  country.  Of  the  five  Colonies 
unrepresented  by  regularly  appointed  delegates,  some  expressed  their  regrets 
that  they  had  not  been  present  by  their  representatives ;  others  alleged  they 
had  not  had  time  for  action.  But  one  and  all  joined  in  sustaining  the  action 
of  the  Congress,  and  in  preparing  similar  petitions  to  the  Parliament  and  the 
king.1 

No  sooner  were  these  proceedings  known  in  England  than  the  conviction 
became  general  that  the  policy  of  the  Stamp  Act  had  not  only  been  unwise, 
but  that  its  results  were  likely  to  prove  fatal.  The  friends  of  the  Colonies 
concentrated  all  their  forces  for  its  abolition.  The  ministry  which  introduced 
the  Stamp  Act  was  dismissed  from  power,  and  the  Marquis  of  Rockingham, 
the  Duke  of  Grafton,  and  others  supposed  to  be  more  favorable  to  the  cause 
of  the  Colonies,  were  elevated  to  power.  They  had  a  fair  opportunity  to  put 
an  end,  at  least  for  a  considerable  period,  to  the  troubles  growing  up  between 
the  empire  and  the  Colonies,  but  they  missed  the  chance.  In  the  House  of 
Commons,  Conway  introduced  a  resolution,  declaring  that  '  Parliament  has 
power  to  bind  the  Colonies  and  the  people  of  America  in  all  cases  whatso- 
ever,' with  the  well-known  purpose  of  presenting  immediately  another  resolu- 
tion abolishing  the  Stamp  Act. 

Franklin  at  the  Bar  of  the  House  of  Commons. — While  the  debate  was  in 
progress,  Franklin  was  summoned,  February  13th,  1766,  to  the  bar  of  the 
House.  Much  depended  on  what  ^e  was  to  say,  for  he  carried  more  weight 
with  him  than  any  other  American.  His  words  were  to  be  imperishable.  I 
need  not  give  his  testimony ;  for  if  there  be  an  American  who  does  not 
know  it,  he  must  go  back  to  his  school-books.  A  few  great  facts  came  out 
on  his  examination,  which  were  ever  after  to  remain  landmarks  for  argument, 
as  they  became  luminous  points  in  the  history  of  the  Colonies  : — He  showed 
that  the  Stamp  tax  could  never  be  paid ;  that  there  was  not  gold  and  silver 
enough  in  the  Colonies  to  do  it.  There  were  neither  post  roads  nor  means 
of  sending  stamps  into  the  interior.  There  were  only  three  hundred  thousand 
white  men,  from  sixteen  to  sixty  years  of  age,  in  the  country.  The  Colonies 
were  now  imposing  on  themselves  many  and  very  heavy  taxes,  in  part  to  dis- 
charge debts  and  mortgages  on  all  their  estates,  contracted  in  a  British  war, 
commenced  for  the  defence  of  a  purely  British  trade,  and  of  the  territories 
of  the  crown ;  that  they  had  never  refused  men  or  means  for  the  defence  of 
the  empire ;  that  until  oppressive  acts  were  resorted  to  by  the  home  govern- 
ment, they  had  been  governed  at  the  expense  of  only  a  little  pen,  ink  and 
paper ;  that  they  recognized  the  authority  of  Parliament  in  all  legislation,  ex- 
cept such  as  should  lay  internal  duties  ;  that  they  considered  Parliament  the 
great  bulwark  of  their  liberties  and  privileges,  but  that  their  temper  was  now 

1  Delegates  chosen  by  the  House  of  Representatives  composed  the  Congress.     New  Hampshire,  though  not 

of  Massachusetts,  of  Rhode  Island,  Connecticut,  Penn-  present  by  deputy,  yet  agreed  to  abide  by  the  result; 

sylvania,  Maryland,   and   South  Carolina  ;    delegates  and  they  were  gladdened  during  their  session  by  the 

named  by  a  written  requisition  from  the  individual  re-  arrival  of   the  express  messenger  from  Georgia,  sent 

presentatives  of  Delaware  and  New  Jersey,  and   the  near  a  thousand  miles  by  land  to  obtain  a  copy  of  the* 

Legislative  Co  nmittee  of  Correspondence  of  New  York,  proceedings. — Bancroft,  voL  v.  p.  334. 


238  STRUGGLE  FOR  LIBERTY  IN  PARLIAMENT. 

much  altered,  and  their  respect  for  it  diminished;  and  that  if  the  Stamp  Act 
was  not  repealed,  it  would  result  in  a  total  loss  of  the  respect  and  affection 
which  they  bore  to  the  mother  country,  and  of  all  the  commerce  that  had  de-  • 
pended  on  that  feeling  of  loyalty  and  regard.  '  Do  you  think  the  people  of 
America,'  asked  Lord  Granville,  *  would  submit  to  pay  the  Stamp  duty  if  it 
was  moderated  ? '  '  No,  never  :  they  will  not  submit  to  it.'  '  Could  not  a 
military  force  carry  that  act  into  execution  ? '  The  answer  was  :  ■  Suppose  a 
military  force  to  be  sent  into  America ;  they  will  find  nobody  in  arms.  What 
are  they  then  to  do  ?  They  cannot  force  a  man  to  take  stamps  who  chooses 
to  do  without  them;  they  will  not  find  rebellion;  they  may  indeed  make  one.' 
1  How  then  would  the  Americans  receive  a  future  tax,  imposed  on  the  same 
principle  ? '     Answer  :  '  Just  as  they  do  this — they  would  not  pay  it.' 

The  New  York  Newsboys  of  the  Last  Century. — The  issue  had  come  ;  the 
question  of  repeal  was  to  be  met.  It  was  the  20th  of  February.  The  con- 
tinents were  wide  apart  in  those  days,  and  the  '  Sons  of  Liberty '  in  New  York 
knew  little  of  what  was  going  on  in  London.  But  we  learn  from  the  New 
York  Gazette  of  February  20th,  1766,  that  on  that  same  morning,  copies  of 
that  journal,  containing  the  Resolutions  they  had  just  passed,  to  the  effect  that 
they  were  determined  to  risk  life,  and  fortune,  and  all  they  had,  in  resisting 
the  Stamp  Act,  and  that  the  safety  of  the  Colonies  depended  upon  their  united 
determination,  were  being  cried  through  the  streets  of  New  York. 

The  Trial-day  in  the  House  of  Commons. — That  same  morning,  Pitt  had 
1  hobbled  into  the  House  of  Commons  on  crutches,  swathed  in  flannels,'  '  too 
ill,'  as  he  declared,  'to  leave  his  bed  for  any  other  cause  than  to  secure  the 
liberties  of  the  American  Colonies,  and  save  them  for  the  empire.'  The 
House  was  crowded ;  the  friends  and  the  enemies  of  America  were  there. 
Between  four  and  five  hundred  members  had  assembled,  and  the  clock  pointed 
towards  midnight  when  the  great  orator  rose  to  deliver  that  speech  which 
was  to  be  forever  memorable,  not  only  worthy  from  its  eloquence  to  have 
fallen  from  the  lips  of  Demosthenes,  but  whose  prophetic  truth  would  not 
have  dishonored  an  ancient  prophet.  He  maintained  that  the  power  of  gov- 
ernment and  legislation  vested  in  Parliament  by  the  British  Constitution,  did 
not  embrace  the  power  of  taxing  the  Colonies  without  representation ;  and 
he  demanded,  in  the  name  of  that  Constitution,  and  on  grounds  of  eternal 
justice,  that  the  Stamp  Act  should  be  repealed,  '  totally,  absolutely,  and  im- 
mediately.' 

Burke  a  Spectator  of  the  Scene. — Edmund  Burke,  the  rising  statesman  of 
England,  who  had  already  enlisted  his  mighty  talents  on  the  side  of  the  Colo- 
nies, and  was  an  eager  and  joyous  spectator  of  the  scene,  says,  that  upwards 
of  three  hundred  London  merchants,  representing  the  commerce  of  the  na- 
tion, had  waited  outside  into  the  night,  to  learn  the  fate  of  the  resolution  of 
repeal ;  and  when  the  shouts  rang  through  the  vaulted  passage-ways  of  St. 
Stephen's  on  the  announcement  of  the  result,  the  joy  of  the  commercial  repre 


EDMUSD  BL'UKE. 
{From  aMiniaturebu  jSt'r  Joshua  Reynolds.) 


REPEAL  OF  THE  STAMP  ACT.  239 

sentatives  was  irrepressible.  Walpole  also  says,  that  when  the  doors  were 
thrown  open,  a  burst  of  gratitude  greeted  Conway  as  he  appeared,  and  the 
groups  gathered  around  him  seemed  like  captives  greeting  their  deliverer. 
Burke  says,  '  his  face  shone  as  if  it  had  been  the  face  of  an  angel.'  Granville 
the  defeated  minister,  moved  along,  swelling  with  rage  and  mortification, 
while  the  crowd  pressed  on  him  with  hisses.  But  when  the  venerable  Pitt 
appeared,  that  crowd  was  uncovered,  and  the  same  enthusiastic,  but  more 
reverent  gratitude,  which  they  manifested,  touched  him  with  the  tenderest  de- 
light. Many  attended  his  chair  as  he  was  carried  out  from  the  venerable 
pile,  and  the  multitude  followed  him  with  their  benedictions. 

An  ebullition  of  joy  broke  forth  from  the  American  Colonies  when  they 
received  the  news.1  South  Carolina  voted  a  statue  to  Pitt,  and  Virginia  one 
to  the  king ;  and  an  obelisk  was  raised,  on  which  the  names  of  the  friends  of 
the  Colonies  in  England  were  engraved.  Even  Washington  himself  said : 
'  They  have  all  my  thanks  for  their  opposition  of  that  act  of  oppression ; 
since  to  have  attempted  its  enforcement,  I  am  satisfied,  would  have  been  at- 
tended with  consequences  more  direful  than  had  been  generally  apprehended.' 

Nothing  gained  by  the  repeal. — But  the  joy  of  the  repeal  of  the  Stamp 
Act  was  short-lived.  The  eyes  of  the  people  were  still  opened  in  the  direc- 
tion of  the  British  throne,  and  serious  apprehensions,  which  afterwards  proved 
too  well  grounded,  were  felt,  lest  other  acts  of  aggression  should  be  proclaim- 
ed. The  statesmen  of  America  knew  that  Great  Britain  had  given  up  noth- 
ing— it  had  been  a  source  of  regret  and  mortification  to  all  clear-headed 
Englishmen,  when  the  Imperial  Legislature,  bent  to  the  necessity  of  the  oc- 
casion, should  have  vitiated  the  moral  influence  of  the  deed  by  the  follow- 
ing puerile  declaration :  '  Parliament  has  a  right  to  bind  the  Colonies  in  all 
cases  whatsoever. '  Machiavelli  somewhere  says  :  That  wise  princes,  when 
forced  to  bend,  do  it  with  a  grace  which  wins  the  populace.'  This  remark 
could  never  have  been  applied  to  the  Parliament  of  England.  The  right  to  tax 
America  in  all  cases  whatsoever  was  still  asserted  there  ;  it  was  denied  here. 
It  had  been  the  question  of  right  only,  from  the  beginning;  it  was  then  what 
the  stubborn  John  Adams  afterwards  said  :  '  The  right  to  take  one  pound  im- 
plies the  right  to  take  a  thousand.' 

What  the  Colonies  had  suffered  from  actual  tyranny  was  hardly  worth 

1  A  bright  day  in  May  was  set  apart  in  Boston  for         From  every  pulpit  ascended   thanks   to  Almighty 

the  display  of  public  gladness,  and  the  spot  where  re-  God.     Mayhew,  of  Boston,    the  apostle  of  freedom, 

sistance  to  the  Stamp  Act  began,  was  the  centre  of  at-  from  his  own  pulpit  addressed  the  following  words  to 

traction.     At  one  in  the  morning  the  bell  nearest  Lib-  Pitt,  as  though  he  were  actually  standing  before  th« 

erty  Tree  was  the  first  to  be  rung  ;  at  dawn  colors  and  altar,  instead  of  lying  prostrate  upon  his  sick-bed  in 

pendants  rose  over  the  housetops  all  around  it;  and  distant  England  :    'To  you  grateful  America  attributes 

the  steeple  of  the  nearest  meeting  house  was  hung  with  that  she  is  reinstated  in  her  former  liberties.     The  uni- 

banners.     During  the  day  all  prisoners  for  debt  were  versal  joy  of  America  blessing  you  as  our  father,  and 

released  by  subscription.      In   the  evening  the  town  sending  up  ardent  vows  to  heaven  for  you,  must  give 

shone  as  though  night  had  not  come.    An  obelisk  on  you  a  sublime  and  truly  God-like  pleasure  ;  it  might 

the  Commor.   was  brilliant  with   a  loyal   inscription  ;  perhaps  give  you  spirits  and  vigor  to  take  up  your  bed 

the  houses  round  Liberty  Tree  exhibited  illuminated  and  walk,  like  those  cured  by  the  word  of  Him  who 

figures,  not  of  the  King  only,  but  of  Pitt,  Camden,  and  came  from  heaven  to  make  us  free  indeed.     America 

Barrel  and  Liberty  Tree  itself  was  decorated  with  Ian-  calls  you  over  and  over  again  her  father :  live  on  in 

terns  till  its  boughs  could  hold  no  more. — Bancroft,  health  and  happiness  and  honor.     Be  it  late  when  you 

vol.  v.  p.  458.  must  cease  to  plead  the  cause  of  liberty  on  earth.' 


240  FRESH  AGGRESSIONS  ON  THE  COLONIES. 

mentioning  ;  nor  would  the  oppression  which  any  community  suffers  from  op- 
pression be  worth  mentioning,  if  they  resisted  it  to  the  death  on  the  start 
Tyranny  is  not  so  strong  as  tyrants  think  ;  it  is  one  of  the  weakest  of  things, 
for  when  brave  men  strike  it  they  shiver  it  to  a  thousand  pieces.  Despotism  ia 
strong  only  where  men  themselves  are  weak.  But  America  began  to  teach 
the  sublime  principles  of  free  government  to  the  parent  country,  and  unfalter 
ingly  was  she  to  press  her  noble  lessons  till  they  had  been  conned,  and  at  last 
comprehended.  The  history  of  the  Colonies  for  the  next  eight  years  may  be 
summed  up  in  resistance  to  acts  of  oppression  from  the  British  government. 
Every  new  measure  was  attended  with  new  odium,  and  inflamed  still  deeper 
indignation.  In  June,  1767,  a  tax  was  laid  on  several  articles  imported  into 
the  Colonies.  In  July,  an  act  established  a  Board  of  Trade  and  Commissioners 
of  Customs,  independent  of  the  colonial  legislatures.  A  few  days  later, 
another  act  of  Parliament  prohibited  the  Assembly  of  New  York  performing 
any  act  of  legislation  whatever — the  pretext  being  they  had  refused  comply- 
ing with  the  requirements  of  the  Mutiny  act.  Protests  were  made  by  Assem- 
blies, non-importation  associations  were  formed,  and  pamphlets,  newspapers, 
orators  and  preachers,  everywhere  instigated  the  people  to  resistance.  In 
February,  1768,  the  Assembly  of  Massachusetts  sent  out  a  Circular  Letter  to 
the  other  Colonial  Assemblies,  inviting  them  to  co-operate  in  obtaining  redress 
of  grievances,  and  cordial  responses  were  sent  back  with  the  bold  declara- 
tion that  Parliament  had  no  right  to  tax  the  Colonies  without  their  consent. 
The  ministry  resented  this  bold  act  of  Massachusetts,  and  ordered  the  Assem- 
bly, in  the  name  of  the  king,  to  rescind  the  Letter.  They  deliberately  resolved 
that  they  would  ?wt  rescind  it.  Said  James  Otis,  in  the  Legislature  :  '  When 
Lord  Hillsborough  knows  we  will  not  rescind  our  acts,  he  should  apply  to 
Parliament  to  rescind  theirs'  '  Let  Britons,'  exclaimed  the  defiant  Samuel  Adams, 
1  rescind  their  measures,  or  the  Colonies  are  lost  to  them  forever.'  When  the 
new  Commissioners  of  Customs  arrived  in  Boston,  in  May,  1768,  they  seized 
a  sloop  whose  owner  had  ordered  it  to  sail  without  complying  with  the  new 
customs'  requisitions.  They  were  unfortunate  in  the  selection  of  their  vessel, 
for  it  belonged  to  John  Hancock,  the  last  man  whose  'property  they  could  well 
afford  to  touch.  The  Commissioners  were  assailed  by  a  mob  ;  their  houses 
were  injured  ;  and  they  were  compelled  to  seek  shelter  in  Castle  William. 

British  Soldiers  march  i?ito  Boston,  September,  1768. — Barnard,  the  Royal 
Governor,  ordered  General  Gage  to  enter  Boston  with  his  troops  to  overawe 
the  people,  and  on  a  quiet  Sabbath  morning,  late  in  September,  1768,  they 
marched  in  '  with  drums  beating,  and  colors  flying,  and,  with  all  the  insolence 
of  conquerors,  took  possession  of  a  captured  city.'  Deeply  outraged  to  see 
their  beautiful  Common  turned  into  a  camp  ground  for  mercenary  soldiers,  the 
Assembly  refused  them  food  and  shelter.  The  indignation  of  the  citizens 
could  hardly  be  restrained,  and  collisions  took  place. 

The  People  rise  against  the  Troops — March  2,  1770. — Finally,  on  March 


THK   1EA  THROWN  INTO  BOSTON  HARBOR.  241 

2d,  1770,  the  people  rose  to  drive  the  troops  from  the  city.  The  soldiers  fired 
on  them,  killing  three  and  wounding  others,  the  bells  rang  an  alarm,  and  the 
whole  population  poured  into  the  streets.  Governor  Hutchinson  was  com- 
pelled to  give  assurances  that  their  wishes  should  be  respected.  They  de- 
manded the  instant  withdrawal  of  the  troops,  and  the  trial  of  Captain  Pres- 
ton, the  commander  of  the  guard,  who  had  fired  on  the  moby  for  murder.  The 
demand  was  granted. 

The  Tea  thrown  into  the  Boston  Harbor. — One  of  the  most  odious  measures 
was  an  act  allowing  the  East  India  Company,  the  then  all-powerful  corpora- 
tion of  the  empire,  to  export  its  teas  to  America,  free  of  duty  in  England, 
and  large  quantities  were  shipped  in  1773.  But  there  was  a  universal  deter- 
mination to  prevent  its  introduction,  and,  under  the  disguise  of  Indians^  some 
Boston  men  boarded  the  tea  ships,  broke  open  three  hundred  and  forty-two 
chests,  and  cast  their  contents  into  the  sea.  This  was  followed  by  an  Act  of 
Parliament  to  punish  the  people  of  Boston,  and  their  port  was  closed.1  This 
might  all  have  been  very  well  had  it  succeeded  as  a  punishment.  But  no 
measure  since  the  Stamp  Act  had  excited  such  wide  and  bitter  hostility.  It 
blended  the  Colonies  together  as  if  in  the  welding  of  a  seven  times  heated 
furnace.  The  cup  of  British  iniquity  was  full ;  it  would  hold  no  more,  and 
the  case  was  now  to  be  decided  by  '  the  last  argument  of  kings.' a 

Imperial  Legislation  of  Retaliation  and  Revenge.  The  Boston  Port  Bill. — 
Boston  had  now  become  the  focal  point  on  which  the  indignation  of  England 
was  bent,  and  the  centre  from  which  the  fires  of  the  Revolution  were  to  ra- 
diate. For  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  Colonies,  the  law  of  retaliation 
and  revenge  was  invoked  against  them.  In  March,  1774,  with  the  avowed 
object  of  punishing  the  people  of  Boston  for  having  resisted  the  introduction  of 
the  East  India  Company's  teas,  Parliament  interdicted  '  all  commercial  inter 
course  with  the  port  of  Boston,  and  prohibited  landing  and  shipping  any  goods 
in  that  place,'  until  indemnity  should  be  rendered.  This  act  was  called  the 
Boston  Port  Bill.  When  the  news  of  its  passage  reached  America,  the  people 
of  Boston  in  a  public  meeting  declared  'that  the  impolicy,  injustice,  and  in- 
humanity of  the  act  exceeded  their  powers  of  expression.'  The  Assembly 
met,  but  the  Governor  ordered  its  members  to  remove  to  Salem.  They  reas- 
sembled there  and  passed  revolutionary  measures,  among  which  was  a  recom- 
mendation to  all  the  Colonies  to  '  choose  delegates  to  a  National  Congress,  to 
consider  the  alarming  aspect  of  public  affairs,'  and  five  men  of  character  and 

1  On   the  1st  of  June,  1774,   the  Boston  Port    Bill  different  colonies ;  and  the  City  of  London,  in  its  cor- 

went   into  operation.     It  was   a   heavy  blow  for   the  porate  capacity,  subscribed  one  hundred  and  fifty  thou- 

doomed  town.     Business  was  crushed,  and  great  suf-  sand  dollars  for  the  poor  of  Boston. — Lossing's  History 

fering   ensued.     The  utter   prostration   of  trade    soon  of  the  United  States,  page  226. 

produced  wide-spread  distress.     The  rich,  deprived  of  2  These  words,  in  Latin,  were  often    placed    upon 

their  rents,  became  straitened  :  and  the   poor,  denied  cannon.   Before  the  armory  at  Richmond,  Virginia,  was 

the  privilege  of  laboring,  were  reduced  to  beggary,  destroyed,  in  April,  1865,  several  old  French  cannons 

All  classes   felt  the  scourge   of  the  oppressor,  but  bore  made  of  brass   were    there,    on   two  of   which   d>ese 

it  with  remarkable  fortitude.     They  were  conscious  of  words  appeared.    They  also  appear  upon  some  French 

being  right,  and  everywhere,  tokens  of  liveliest  sympa-  cannon    at  West    Point.— Lossing's    History  of  tA* 

thy  were  manifested.      Flour,  rice,  cereal  grains,  fuel  United  States,  note  3,  page  226. 
and  money,  were  sent  to  the  suffering  people  from  the 
16 


'242  SYMPA  THY  WITH  MASS  A  CHUSETTS. 

distinction  were  selected  to  represent  Massachusetts  in  that  body.  The  mo- 
tive of  General  Gage  in  removing  the  Assembly  to  Salem,  arose  in  the  belief 
that,  by  closing  the  port  of  Boston,  the  increase  of  trade  in  Salem  would  win 
the  people  to  the  side  of  the  crown.  But  in  a  public  meeting  they  declared 
1  that  Nature,  in  forming  their  harbor,  had  prevented  their  becoming  rivals  in 
trade,  and  even  if  it  were  otherwise,  they  should  regard  themselves  lost  to  all 
sense  of  justice,  and  all  feelings  of  humanity,  could  they  indulge  one  thought 
of  raising  their  fortunes  upon  the  ruins  of  their  countrymen.' 

Sympathy  with  Massachusetts  Bay. — In  the  meantime  the  sympathy  and 
aid  of  the  people  of  the  other  colonies  were  freely  extended  to  Boston,  to  re- 
lieve the  commercial  embarrassment  which  followed  the  enforcement  of  the 
Port  Bill.  It  seems  proper  here  to  notice  the  significant  fact  that,  in  the  at- 
tempt to  drag  the  colonists  into  slavish  obedience  to  British  tyranny,  Parlia- 
ment abandoned  all  the  accepted  canons  of  enlightened  Statesmanship,  and 
went  back  to  the  precedents  of  antiquity,1  inflicting  so  far  as  it  could,  the 
curse  of  non-intercourse  between  sea-ports,  towns,  and  neighbors.3  How 
futile  was  this  scheme  of  short-sighted  policy,  soon  appeared.  It  linked 
those  Thirteen  Colonies  together  with  'hooks  of  steel'  in  a  crusade  against  the 
common  foe.  Money  poured  into  Boston  from  every  quarter,  with  words  of 
encouragement,  and  inspirations  of  hope.  The  noble  Virginians,  when  they 
heard  of  this  Boston  Port  Bill,  rallied  round  the  House  of  Burgesses  then  in 
session,  and  asked  that  the  solemn  enactment  of  a  public  fast  should  be  pro- 
claimed. On  Tuesday,  the  24th  of  May,  the  House  of  Burgesses  passed  an 
order  which  stands  upon  their  journal  in  the  following  terms: — '  Tuesday,  the 
24th  of  May,  14  George  III.,  1774.  This  house,  being  deeply  impressed  with 
apprehension  of  the  great  dangers  to  be  derived  to  British  America,  from  the 
hostile  invasion  of  the  City  of  Boston,  in  our  sister-colony  of  Massachusetts 
Bay,  whose  commerce  and  harbor  are,  on  the  first  day  of  June  next,  to  be 
stopped  by  an  armed  force,  deem  it  highly  necessary  that  the  said  first  day  of 
June  be  set  apart,  by  the  members  of  this  house,  as  a  day  of  fasting,  humilia- 

1  All  commercial  restrictions  arose  in  the  policy  of  bar-  — clearly  laid  down  the  broad  principles  which  should 

barous  nations,  who  wished  to  exclude  men  and  com-  have  guided  British  statesmen  in  treating  the  American 

munities  from  intercourse  with  each  other.     Tariffs  question.   Of  the  crisis,  which  he  clearly  foresaw  was  ap- 

grew  out  of  barbarism.     All  the  maritime  nations  ef  proaching,  he  unhesitatingly  declared,  that  the  Ameri- 

antiquity  had  their  commercial  agents  in  foreign  coun-  can  Colonies  should  either  be  fairly  represented  in  the 

tries  visited  by  their  vessels  or  trading  citizens,  sent  British    Parliament,    or    allowed  their    independence. 

to  guard  their  interests,  and  protect  their  property  and  He  pronounced   the  prohibitory  laws   of  England  '  a 

lives.      Without  such  protection  the  property  of  every  manifest  violation  of  the  most  sacred  rights — imperti- 

adventurer  committed    to  the  sea,  was   likely  to  fall  nent  badges  of  slavery  imposed  upon  the  colonies  with- 

into  the  hands  of  pirates,  or  to  be  treated  with  injus-  out  any  sufficient  reason,  by  the  groundless  jealousv 

tice  in  foreign  ports.    In  few  of  the  ancient  nations  was  of  the  merchants  and    manufacturers  of   the   mother 

there  any  regard  paid  to  individual  rights.  The  sacred-  country.'     '  Great  Britain  derives  nothing  but  loss  from 

ness  of  private  rights  was  a  principle  almost  as   urr-  the  dominion   she   assumes  over  her  colonies.'       He 

known  as  the  operations  of  galvanism.  We  have  heard  even  went  so  far  as  to  say  :    '  It  is  not  very  probable 

much  of  the  civilization  of  Rome  ;  but,  while  her  ora-  that  they  will  ever  voluntarily  submit  to  us  ;   the  blood 

tors  and  poets  were  bringing  her  beautiful  tongue  to  which  must  be  shed  in  forcing  them  to  do  so  is,  every 

perfection,  and  sculptors   and   architects  were  creat-  drop  of  it,  the  blood  of  those  who  are,  or  of  those  whom 

mg    their    matchless    ideals   of  strength  and  beauty,  we  wish  to  have  for  our  fellow-citizens.'      'They  are 

she  treated  all  foreign  nations  as  her  natural  foes.     All  very  weak  who  flatter  themselves  that  in  the  state  to 

vessels  driven  by  stress  of  weather  upon  her  coasts  were  which  things  are  come,  our  colonies  will  be  easily  con- 

jonfiscated,  and  the  crews  were  put  to  death.  In  those  quered  by  force  alone.'     He  further  indicates  the  vast 

days,  might  so  effectually  constituted   right,  that  ^he  advantages   Great  Britain  would   at  once  and  perma- 

weaker  party  no  more  thought  of  asking  for  justice,  nently   derive,   if  she  'should  voluntarily  give  up  all 

than  the  enemy  conquered  in  battle  hoped  for  mercy.  authority  over  her  colonies,  and   leave   them  to  elect 

2  Adam  Smith — the  foremost  political  economist  of  their  own  magistrates,  to  enact  their  own  laws,  and  tt 

that  time,  if  not  indeed  the  most  illuminated  of  any  age  make  peace  and  war  as  they  might  think  proper.' 


SPIRIT  OF  INDEPENDENCE  IN  VIRGINIA.  243 

tion  and  prayer,  devoutly  to  implore  the  Divine  interposition  for  averting  the 
heavy  calamity  which  threatens  destruction  to  our  civil  rights,  and  the  evils  of 
civil  war ;  to  give  us  one  heart  and  one  mind,  firmly  to  oppose,  by  all  just 
and  proper  means,  every  injury  to  American  rights ;  and  that  the  minds  of 
His  Majesty  and  his  Parliament,  may  be  inspired  from  above  with  wisdom, 
moderation,  and  justice,  to  remove  from  the  loyal  people  of  America  all 
cause  of  danger  from  a  continued  pursuit  of  measures  pregnant  with  their 
ruin. 

1  Ordered,  therefore,  That  the  members  of  this  house  do  attend  in  their 
places,  at  the  hour  of  ten  in  the  forenoon,  on  the  said  first  day  of  June  next, 
in  order  to  proceed  with  the  Speaker  and  the  mace  to  the  church  in  this  city, 
for  the  purposes  aforesaid ;  and  that  the  Reverend  Mr.  Price  be  appointed 
to  read  prayers,  and  to  preach  a  sermon  suitable  to  the  occasion.' 

Enraged  at  these  treasonable  proceedings  Lord  Dunmore  prorogued  the 
Assembly.  But  they  at  once  withdrew  to  the  Raleigh  tavern,  and  formed  an 
association,  signed  by  89  members  of  the  late  House  of  Burgesses.  Their 
address  breathes  a  spirit  of  such  lofty  statesmanship  and  manhood,  that  it 
deserves  a  place  in  any  history  which  portrays,  however  briefly,  the  causes 
which  immediately  led  to  the  Declaration  of  Independence. 

Spirit  of  Independence  in  Virginia. — '  An  Association,  signed  by  89  mem- 
bers of  the  late  House  of  Burgesses.  We,  His  Majesty's  most  dutiful  and 
loyal  subjects,  the  late  representatives  of  the  good  people  of  this  country, 
having  been  deprived,  by  the  sudden  interposition  of  the  executive  part  of 
this  government,  from  giving  our  countrymen  the  advice  we  wished  to  convey 
to  them,  in  a  legislative  capacity,  find  ourselves  under  the  hard  necessity  of 
adopting  this,  the  only  method  we  have  left,  of  pointing  out  to  our  country- 
men such  measures  as,  in  our  opinion,  are  best  fitted  to  secure  our  dear  rights 
and  liberty  from  destruction,  by  the  heavy  hand  of  power  now  lifted  against 
North  America.  With  much  grief  we  find,  that  our  dutiful  applications  to 
Great  Britain  for  the  security  of  our  just,  ancient  and  constitutional  rights, 
have  been  not  only  disregarded,  but  that  a  determined  system  is  formed  and 
pressed,  for  reducing  the  inhabitants  of  British  America  to  slavery,  by  sub- 
jecting them  to  the  payment  of  taxes  imposed  without  the  consent  of  the 
people  or  their  representatives ;  and  that,  in  pursuit  of  this  system,  we  find 
•an  act  of  the  British  Parliament,  lately  passed,  for  stopping  the  harbor  and 
commerce  of  the  town  of  Boston,  in  our  sister-colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay, 
until  the  people  there  submit  to  the  payment  of  such  unconstitutional  taxes; 
and  which  act  most  violently  and  arbitrarily  deprives  them  of  their  property, 
in  wharves  erected  by  private  persons,  at  their  own  great  and  proper  expense  ; 
which  act  is,  in  our  opinion,  a  most  dangerous  attempt  to  destroy  the  con- 
stitutional rights  and  liberty  of  all  North  America.  It  is  further  our  opinion, 
that  as  tea,  on  its  importation  into  America,  is  charged  with  a  duty  impose t? 
by  Parliament,  for  the  purpose  of  raising  a  revenue  without  the  consent  0/ 


244  MEETING  OF  THE  CONTINENTAL  CONGRESS. 

the  people,  it  ought  not  to  be  used  by  any  person  who  wishes  well  to  the 
constitutional  rights  and  liberties  of  British  America.  And  whereas  the 
India  Company  have  ungenerously  attempted  the  ruin  of  America,  by 
sending  many  ships  loaded  with  tea  into  the  Colonies,  thereby  intending 
to  fix  a  precedent  in  favor  of  arbitrary  taxation,  we  deem  it  highly  proper, 
and  do  accordingly  recommend  it  strongly  to  our  countrymen,  not  to  pur- 
chase or  use  any  kind  of  East  India  commodity  whatsoever,  except  saltpetre 
and  spices,  until  the  grievances  of  America  are  reduced.  We  are  further 
clearly  of  opinion,  that  an  attack  made  on  one  of  our  sister-colonies,  to 
compel  submission  to  arbitrary  taxes,  is  an  attack  made  on  all  British 
America,  and  threatens  ruin  to  the  rights  of  all,  unless  the  united  wisdom  of 
the  whole  be  applied.  And  for  this  purpose  it  is  recommended  to  the  com- 
mittee of  correspondence,  that  they  communicate  with  their  several  corre- 
sponding committees,  on  the  expedie?icy  of  appointing  deputies  from  the 
several  colonies  of  British  America,  to  meet  in  general  congress,  at  such 
place,  annually,  as  shall  be  thought  most  convenient ;  there  to  deliberate  on 
those  general  measures  which  the  united  interests  of  America  may  from 
time  to  time  require. 

'A  tender  regard  for  the  interest  of  our  fellow-subjects,  the  merchants  and 
manufacturers  of  Great  Britain,  prevents  us  from  going  further  at  this  time ; 
most  earnestly  hoping,  that  the  unconstitutional  principle  of  taxing  the 
Colonies  without  their  consent  will  not  be  persisted  in,  thereby  to  compel  us, 
against  our  will,  to  avoid  all  commercial  intercourse  with  Britain.  Wishing 
them  and  our  people  free  and  happy,  we  are  their  affectionate  friends,  the  late 
representatives  of  Virginia. 

'The  27th  day  of  May,  1774/ 

On  the  first  day  of  June,  when  the  odious  Port  Bill  was  to  go  into  effect,  a 
touching  sight  was  witnessed  throughout  Virginia.  Everywhere  the  churches 
were  crowded,  and  devoutly  men  gathered  to  keep  this  day  of  fasting,  humili- 
ation, and  prayer. 

Meeting  of  the  Continental  Congress  in  Philadelphia,  September  5,  1774.1 
The  revolutionary  spirit  was  now  up,  and  the  fires  of  the  Revolution  itself  soon 
began  to  burn.  The  old  Continental  Congress  which  had  been  recommended 
by  the  men  of  Boston,  assembled  on  the  5th  of  September,  1774,  in  Philadel- 
phia, then  the  largest  city  in  America.2     Georgia  alone  was  unrepresented. 

1  The  object  of  the  meeting  of  the  Continental  Con-  dredth  Anniversary  of  the  First  Congress  was 

gress  was  fully  expressed  in  the  following  language  :  worthily  celebrated  in    the  Old  Carpenter's  Hall. 

To  consider  the  acts  lately  passed  and  bills  depending  From  the  eloquent  Historical  Address  delivered  by  Mr. 

in  Parliament  with  regard  to  the  Port  of  Boston  and  the  Henry  Armit  Brown,  the  orator  of  the  occasion,  I 

Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  which  acts  and  bills  in  cite  the  following  appropriate  passages  :  — 
their  precedents  and  consequences  affect  the  whole  con-  The  silence  is  first  broken  by  Mr.  Lynch  of  South 

tinent  of  America — also  the  grievances  under  which  Carolina.       'There  is  a  gentleman  present,'  he  says, 

America  labors  by  reason  of  the  several  acts  of  Parlia-  '  who  has  presided  with  great  dignity  over  a  very  re- 

ment  that  impose  taxes  or  duties  for  raising  revenue,  spectable   society,    and   greatly   to  the   advantage    of 

and  lay  unnecessary  restraints  and  burdens  on  trade —  America,'  and  he  'moves  that  the  Hon.  Peyton  Ran- 

and  the  statutes,  Parliamentary  Acts  and  Royal  Instruc-  dolph,   Esq.,  one  of  the  delegates  from   Virginia,    b« 

tions,  which  make  an  invidious  distinction  between  his  appointed  chairman.'     He  doubts  not  it  will  be  unani* 

Majesty's  subjects  in  Great  Britain  and  America.'  mous.     It  is  so,  and  yonder  '  large,  well-looking  man, 

a  On  the  5th  of  this  last  September— 1874— The  Hun-  carefully  dressed  and  with  well-powdered  wig,  rises  and 


CHARACTERISTICS  OF  THE  PRINCIPAL  DELEGATES.      245 

The  Hall  where  the  fathers  of  the  Revolution  gathered  was  tilled  with  patriot- 
ism and  civic  light.  No  such  body  of  men  had  ever  assembled  in  North 
America,  perhaps  it  were  not  too  much  to  say  that  no  such  assembly  had  evel 
met  in  human  history.  England  encountered  here  the  most  formidable  foe 
she  had  met  since  the  time  of  William  the  Conqueror. 

Peyton  Randolph  being  chosen  President,  and  Charles  Thomson1  Secretary 
by  unanimous  vote,  the  house  was  organized  for  business  with  all  the  solem- 
nities of  a  regular  Legislature.'     A  committee  of  two  from  each  colony  was  ap- 


takes  the  chair.  The  commissions  of  the  delegates  are 
then  produced  and  read,  after  which  Mr.  Lynch  nomi- 
nates as  secretary  Mr.  Charles  Thomson,  '  a  gentle- 
man,' he  says,  'of  family,  fortune,  and  character.' 

And  thereupon,  with  that  singular  wisdom  which  our 
early  statesmen  showed  in  their  selection  of  men  for  all 
posts  of  responsibility,  the  Congress  calls  into  his  coun- 
try's service  that  admirable  man,  '  the  Sam  Adams  ot 
Philadelphia  and  the  life  of  the  cause  of  liberty.' 
While  the  preliminaries  are  being  dispatched,  let  us 
take  a  look  at  this  company,  for  it  is  the  most  extraor- 
dinary assemblage  America  has  ever  seen. 

There  are  fifty  delegates  present,  the  representatives 
of  eleven  colonies.  Georgia  has  had  no  election,  the 
North  Carolinians  have  not  yet  arrived,  and  John 
Dickinson,  that  '  shadow,  slender  as  a  reed,  and  pale 
as  ashes,'  that  Pennsylvania  farmer  who  has  sown  the 
seeds  of  empire,  is  not  a  member  yet.  Directly  in  front, 
in  a  seat  of  prominence,  sits  Richard  Henry  Lee.  His 
brilliant  eye  and  Roman  profile  would  make  him  a 
marked  man  in  any  company.  One  hand  has  been  in- 
jured, and  is  wrapped,  as  you  see,  in  a  covering  of 
black  silk,  but,  when  he  speaks,  his  movements  are  so 
graceful  and  his  voice  so  sweet  that  you  forget  the  de- 
fect of  gesture,  for  he  is  an  orator — the  greatest  in 
America,  perhaps,  save  only  one. 

That  tall  man,  with  the  swarthy  face  and  black,  un- 
powdered  hair,  is  William  Livingston^  of  New  Jersey  ; 
1  no  public  speaker,  but  sensible  and  learned.'  Beside 
him,  with  his  slender  form  bent  forward  and  his  face  lit 
•with  enthusiasm,  sits  his  son-in-law,  John  Jay,  soon  to 
be  famous.  He  is  the  youngest  of  the  delegates,  and 
yonder  sits  the  oldest  of  them  all.  His  form  is  bent, 
his  thin  locks  fringing  a  forehead  bowed  with  age  and 
honorable  service,  and  his  hands  shake  tremulously  as 
he  folds  them  in  his  lap.  It  is  Stephen  Hopkins,  once 
Chief  Justice  of  Rhode  Island.  Close  by  him  is  his 
colleague,  Samuel  Ward,  and  Sherman  of  Connecticut, 
that  strong  man,  whose  name  is  to  be  made  honorable 
by  more  than  one  generation.  Johnson  of  Maryland, 
is  here,  '  that  clear,  cool  head,'  and  Paca,  his  colleague, 
'  a  wise  deliberator.' 

Bland  of  Virginia  is  that  learned-looking,  '  bookish- 
man,'  beside  '  zealous,  hot-headed '  Edward  Rutledge. 
The  Pennsylvanians  are  grouped  together,  at  one  side 
• — Morton,  Humphreys,  Mifflin,  Rhoads,  Biddle,  Ross, 
and  Galloway,  the  Speaker  of  the  Assembly.  Bend- 
ing forward  to  whisper  in  the  latter's  ear  is  Duane  ot 
New  York,  that  shy-looking  man,  a  little  '  squint-eyed ' 
(John  Adams  has  already  written  of  him),  '  very  sensi-  1789 
ble  and  very  careful.'  That  large-featured  man,  with 
the  broad,  open  countenance,  is  William  Hooper  ;  that 
other,  with  the  Roman  nose,  is  McKean  of  Delaware. 
Rodney,  the  latter's  colleague,  sits  beside  him,  '  the 
oddest-looking  man  in  the  world,  tall,  thin,  pale,  his 
face  no  bigger  than  a  large  apple,  yet  beaming  with 
sense,  and  wit,  and  humor.' 

Yonder  is  Chris 'opher  Gadsden,  who  has  been  preach- 
ing independence  10  South  Carolina  these  ten  years  past. 
He  it  is  who,  roused  by  the  report  that  the  regulars 
have  commenced  to  bombard  Boston,  proposes  to  march 
forward  and  defeat  Gage  at  once,  before  his  reinforce- 
ments can  arrive  ;  and  when  some  one  timidly  says 
that  in  the  event  of  war  the  British  will  destroy  the  sea- 
port towns,  turns  on  the  speaker  with  this  grand  re- 
ply :  '  Our  towns  are  built  of  brick  and  wood  ;  if  they 
are  burnt  down  we  can  rebuild  them  :  but  liberty  once 
lost  is  gone  forever.1  In  all  this  famous  company,  per- 
haps, the  men  most  noticed  are  the  Massachusetts 
members.     That  colony  has  thus  far  taken  the  lead  in 


the  struggle  with  the  mother  country.  A  British  army 
is  encamped  upon  her  soil ;  the  gates  of  her  chief  town 
are  shut ;  against  her  people  the  full  force  of  the  re- 
sentment of  King  and  Parliament  is  spent.  Her  suffer- 
ings called  this  Congress  into  being,  and  now  lend  a 
sad  prominence  to  her  ambassadors. 

And  of  them,  surely,  Samuel  Adams  is  the  chief. 
What  must  be  his  emotions  as  he  sits  here,  to-day, 
he  who  '  eats  litde,  drinks  little,  sleeps  little,  and  thinks 
much  ; '  that  strong  man,  whose  undaunted  spirit  has 
led  his  countrymen  up  to  the  possibilities  of  this  day. 
It  is  his  plan  of  correspondence,  adopted  after  a  hard 
struggle,  in  November,  1772,  that  first  made  feasible 
a  union  in  the  common  defence.  He  called  for  unior» 
as  early  as  April,,  1773.  For  that  he  had  labored  with- 
out ceasing  and  without  end,  now  arousing  the  droop- 
ing spirits  of  less  sanguine  men  ;  now  repressing  the 
enthusiasm  of  rash  hearts,  which  threatened  to  bring  on 
a  crisis  before  the  time  was  ripe,  and  all  the  while  thun- 
dering against  tyranny  through  the  columns  of  the 
Boston  Gazette.  As  he  was  ten  years  ago  he  is  to- 
day, the  master  spirit  of  the  time  ;  as  cool,  as  watch- 
ful, as  steadfast  now  that  the  hour  of  his  triumph  is  at 
hand,-  as  when,  in  darker  days,  he  took  up  the  burden 
James  Otis  could  no  longer  bear. 

Beside  him  sits  his  younger  kinsman,  John  Adams, 
a  man  after  his  own  heart ;  bold,  fertile,  resolute  ;  an 
eloquent  speaker  and  a  leader  of  men. 

But  whose  is  yonder  tall  and  manly  form?  It  is  that 
of  a  man  of  forty  years  of  age  in  the  prime  of  vigorous 
manhood.  He  has  not  spoken,  for  he  is  no  orator ; 
but  there  is  a  look  of  command  in  his  broad  face  and 
firm-set  mouth  that  marks  him  among  men,  and  seems 
to  justify  the  deference  with  which  his  colleagues  turn 
to  speak  with  him.  He  has  taken  a  back  seat,  as  be- 
comes one  of  his  great  modesty — for  he  is  great  even 
in  that — but  he  is  still  the  foremost  man  in  all  this  com- 
pany. This  is  he  who  has  just  made,  in  the  Virginia 
Convention,  that  speech  which  Lynch  of  Carolina  says 
is  the  most  eloquent  speech  that  ever  was  made  :  '  1 

WILL  RAISE  A  THOUSAND  MEN,  SUBSIST  THEM  AT  MY 
OWN  EXPENSE,  AND  MARCH  WITH  THEM  AT  THEIR  HEAD 

for  the  relief  of  boston.'  These  were  his  words — 
and  his  name  is  Washington. 

Such  was  the  Continental  Congress  assembled  in 
Philadelphia 

1  Thomson  was  Secretary  of  Congress  perpetually.. 
from  1774,  until  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitv- 
tion,  and  the  organization  of  the  new  government  in 
1789.  Watson  relates  that  Thomson  had  just  come 
into  Philadelphia  with  his  bride,  and  was  alighting 
from  his  chaise  when  a  messenger  from  the  delegates 
in  Carpenter's  Hall  came  to  him  and  said  they  wanted 
him  to  come  and  take  minutes  of  their  proceedings,  as 
he  was  an  expert  at  such  business.  For  his  first  year's 
service  he  received  no  pay.  So  Congress  informed  his 
wife,  that  they  wished  to  compensate  her  for  the  ab- 
sence of  her  husband  during  that  time,  and  wished  her 
to  name  what  kind  of  a  piece  of  plate  she  would  like  to 
receive.  She  chose  an  urn,  and  that  silver  vessel  is  yet 
in  the  family.  Thomson  was  born  in  Ireland  in  1730, 
came  to  America  when  eleven  years  of  age,  and  died  in 
1824,  at  the  age  of  ninety-four  years. — Lossing's  Hist, 
of  the  U.  S.,  note  3,  p.  228. 

9  In  speaking  of  the  Congress  at  Philadelphia  in  a 
letter  to  his  wife,  John  Adams  said  : — Sept.  8th,  1774. 
— 'There  is  in  the  Congress  a  collection  of  the  greatest 
men  upon  this  continent  in  point  of  abilities,  virtues  and 
fortunes.'  Also  in  one  of  Sept.  16th.  he  describes  thf 
First  Prayer  in  Congress.      '  When  Congress  firs- 


246        PROCEEDINGS  OF  THE  CONTINENTAL  CONGRESS. 

pointed  to  draw  up  a  Bill  of  Rights :  an  Address  to  the  people  of  Great  Brit 
ain,  written  by  John  Jay ;  another  to  the  several  Anglo-American  colonies, 
written  by  William  Livingston ;  a  third  to  the  inhabitants  of  Quebec,  and 
a  petition  to  the  King.  Massachusetts  was  applauded  for  all  she  had  done, 
and  encouraged  to  persevere ;  while  General  Gage  was  warned  not  to 
inflame  any  further  the  public  indignation,  'lest  the  loyal  Colonies  should 
renounce  their  allegiance  to  the  throne  altogether.'  The  Assembly  also  entered 
into  a  solemn  compact  with  each  other,  and  with  the  country,  '  under  the 
sacred  ties  of  honor  and  love  of  liberty,  neither  to  import,  nor  to  consume, 
any  British  goods  or  products,  after  the  first  of  the  following  December.'  They 
gave  their  pledge  also  to  encourage  manufactures  and  agriculture  at  home, 
and  recommended  the  appointment  of  committees  everywhere  to  see  that  this 
work  was  effectually  done.  They  still  further  resolved  to  remain  in  session 
until  Parliament  repealed  those  odious  and  oppressive  acts. 

All  their  proceedings  were  full  of  dignity.  They  breathed  the  inspiration 
of  the  Greeks,  and  the  firmness  of  the  Romans.  Their  public  Addresses,  Me- 
morials, Resolutions,  Preambles,  and  State  Papers,  were  worthy  of  the  \  giants 
of  those  days.'  Of  them  Lord  Chatham  said  '  that  he  had  studied  and  admired 
the  free  states  of  antiquity,  and  the  master  spirits  of  the  world  :  yet  for  solidity 
of  reasoning,  force  of  sagacity,  and  wisdom  of  conclusion,  under  such  a  com- 
plication of  circumstances,  no  nation  or  body  of  men  could  stand  in  prefer- 
ence to  the  General  Congress  at  Philadelphia.'  Their  memorial  to  the  King 
of  England  was  most  respectful — it  was  even  characterized  by  loyal  love. 
They  only  asked  him  to  restore  those  rights  of  which  they  had  been  robbed. 
They  reminded  him  that  under  his  royal  ancestors,  their  progenitors  had 
enjoyed  those  rights,  and  they  asked  that  they  might  be  restored.  They  said  : 
*  The  apprehension  of  being  degraded  into  a  state  of  servitude  from  the  pre- 
eminent rank  of  English  freemen,  while  our  minds  retain  the  love  of  liberty, 
and  clearly  foreseeing  the  miseries  preparing  for  us  and  our  posterity,  excite 
emotions  in  our  breasts,  which  we  cannot  describe.'  And  to  their  brethren  in 
England  they  made  this  touching  appeal :  '  Can  any  reason  be  given  why  any 
subject  who  lives  three  thousand  miles  from  the  royal  palace,  should  enjoy 
less  liberty  than  those  who  live  three  hundred  miles  from  it  ? '  To  their  own 
constituents  they  spoke  more  boldly,  but  with  more  effect.     They  recounted 

met,  Mr.  Cushing  made  a  motion  that  it  should  be  his  pontificads,  and  read  several  prayers  in  the  estab- 

opened  with  prayer.     It  was  opposed  by  Mr.  Jay  of  lished  form,  and  then  read  the  collect  for  the  7th  day 

New  York,  and  Mr.  Rutledge  of  South  Carolina,  be-  of   Sept.    which    was    the    thirty-fifth    Psalm.  ...  I 

cause  we  were  so  divided  in  religious  sentiments  ;  some  never  saw  a  greater  effect  upon  an  audience.     It  seem- 

Episcopalians,  some  Quakers,  some  Anabaptists,  some  ed  as  if  heaven  had  ordained  that  psalm  to  be  read  on 

Presbyterians,  and  some  Congregationalists,  that  we  that  morning.      After  this  Mr.  Douche\  unexpectedly 

could  not  join  in  the  same  act  of  worship.     Mr.  Samuel  to  everybody,  struck  out    into    an   extempore   prayer 

Adams  arose,  and  said  he  was  no  bigot,  and  could  which  filled  the  bosom  of  every  man  present.     I  must 

hear  a  prayer  from  a  gentleman  of  piety  and  virtue,  confess  I  never  heard  a  better  prayer,  or  one  so  well 

who  was  at  the  same  time  a  friend  to  his  country — he  pronounced.     Episcopalian  as  he  is,  Dr.  Cooper  him- 

was  a  stranger  in  Philadelphia,  but  he  had  heard  that  self  never  prayed  with  such  fervor,  such  ardor,  such 

Mr.  Douche1  deserved  that  character,  and  therefore  he  earnestness  and    pathos,  and   in  language  so  elegant 

moved    that    Mr.    Douche^  an    Episcopal  clergyman,  and    sublime,  for  America,  for  the   Congress,  for  the 

might  be  desired  to  read  prayers  to  the  Congress  to-  province   of  Massachusetts    Bay,  and    especially  the 

morrow    morning.     The    motion    was    seconded    and  town  of  Boston.     It  had  an  excellent  effect  upon  evcry- 

passed  in  the  affirmative.     Mr.  Randolph,  our  Presi-  body  here.     I  must  beg  you  to  read  that  psalm.      If 

dent,  waited  on  Mr.  Douche"  and  received  for  answer  there  was  any  faith  in  sortes  Vigilance,  or  sortes  Hio- 

that  if  his  health  would  permit  he  certainly  would.     Ac-  mericcE,  or  especially  in  sortes  Biblicce,  it  would  b< 

cordingly  next  morning  he  appeared  with  his  clerk  ,<id  thought  providential.' 


THE  SOLEMNITY  OF  THE  OCCASION.  247 

the  oppressive  acts  of  Parliament  from  the  French  War,  in  which  so  many  oi 
their  friends  had  poured  out  their  blood  like  water  for  the  flag  of  England. 
They  justly  praised  the  spirit  of  independence  that  pervaded  the  Colonies, 
and  forecasting  the  future  summoned  every  true  man  to  the  post  of  vigilance 
and  danger. 

This  Congress  was  clothed  with  all  necessary  power.  Its  delegates  were 
appointed  to  be  the  supreme  judges  of  the  great  cause  at  stake.  They  were 
posted  as  trusty  sentinels  on  the  outer  walls  of  North  American  freedom,  and 
the  whole  country  looked  up  reverently  to  them  when  they  spoke.  What- 
ever they  said,  resolved,  or  recommended,  went  forth  through  the  land  with 
all  the  sanction  which  justice,  virtue,  and  heroism  always  command,  but 
which  mere  formal  authority  never  inspires. 

It  was  now  fast  becoming  evident  even  to  common  observers  that  a  great 
issue  was  to  be  made  between  the  Colonists  and  the  King.  The  American 
people  were  fast  shaking  from  themselves  the  incubus  of  traditional  allegiance 
to  a  distant  and  unfriendly  monarch.  What  cared  these  free  brave  men  in  the 
forests  of  the  Western  World  for  rules,  precedents,  or  authorities  established  by 
the  despotisms  of  old  Europe  ?  The  hour  which  Berkeley  had  prophesied  had 
come,  when 

1  The  Muse,  disgusted  at  an  age  and  clime 

Barren  of  every  glorious  theme, 
In  distant  lands  now  waits  a  better  time, 
Producing  subjects  worthy  fame.' 

These  words  were  on  every  lip,  and  the  sentiment  was  in  every  heart.  How 
much  had  the  rules  of  the  political  systems  of  Europe  helped  them  while  they 
were  hewing  their  way  through  howling  forests  ?  What  had  conventionalism! 
done  for  them  while  they  were  battling  wild  beasts  and  merciless  savages  ? 
And  what  help  could  they  get  from  the  political  philosophy  of  the  Old  World, 
in  constructing  a  new  political  system  here  ? 

When  American  men  pitted  themselves  against  the  greatest  monarch  on 
earth,  they  did  it  with  deliberation — there  was  no  haste  about  it.  There  were 
minute  men,  it  is  true,  in  the  Revolution,  all  through  the  Colonies.  But  the 
men  in  this  Congress  who  led  the  way  to  that  struggle,  acted  with  a  deliberation 
from  which  all  apprehension  of  danger  had  fled  from  every  mind,  as  the  morn- 
ing's mists  move  from  the  mountain  tops.  So  deeply  had  this  spirit  imbued 
the  nation,  that  the  moulding  seal  of  that  Congress  seemed  to  have  been 
stamped  on  the  whole  people  ;  and  the  moment  the  tocsin  sounded,  as  though 
some  invisible,  but  giant  hand  had  sowed  the  soil  with  dragons'  teeth,  armed 
men  everywhere  sprang  up. 

The  Provincial  Congress  of  Massachusetts. — General  Gage  had  seized  all 
the  stores  in  the  neighborhood  of  Boston,  and  done  other  oppressive  acts  which 


248  CHATHAM'S  DEFENCE  OF  AMERICA. 

enraged  the  anger  of  Massachusetts  to  such  a  point,  that  their  Assembly 
whose  deliberations  had  been  broken  up  by  the  interference  of  the  Governor 
convened  at  Salem,  and  resolved  themselves  into  a  Provincial  Congress,  and 
adjourned  to  Concord,  sixteen  miles  in  the  interior.  Their  first  act  was  tc 
elect  John  Hancock  to  preside  over  them.  Assuming  that  they  were  clothed 
with  supreme  authority  in  all  matters  of  legislation,  they  made  the  necessary 
provisions  for  maintaining  their  liberties. 

Chatham's  Defence  of  America. — At  the  next  meeting  of  Parliament,  Nov- 
ember 20,  1774,  the  spirit  of  rebellion  in  Massachusetts  was  the  prominent  sub- 
ject in  the  King's  speech,  and  he  made  known  his  inflexible  determination  to 
put  down  any  attempt  to  imperil  the  royal  authority  in  the  Colonies.  Once 
more  Lord  Chatham  came  to  their  defence.  '  The  way,'  said  he,  '  must  be 
immediately  opened  for  a  reconciliation.  It  will  soon  be  too  late.  They  say 
you  have  no  right  to  tax  them  without  their  consent.  They  say  truly.  Repre- 
sentation and  taxation  must  go  together — they  are  inseparable.  They  do  not 
hold  the  language  of  slaves.  They  do  not  ask  you  to  repeal  your  laws  as  a 
favor.  They  claim  it  as  a  right.  They  tell  you  that  they  will  not  submit  to 
these  acts,  and  I  tell  you  they  must  be  repealed,  and  you  must  go  through  the 
work.  You  must  declare  that  you  have  no  right  to  tax  them.  Then  they  may 
trust  you.'1 

But  Chatham's  plan  for  reconciliation  with  America  failed.  All  the  per- 
sonal influence  of  the  King,  and  the  weight  of  office  and  power,  were  brought 
against  the  American  cause,  and  whoever  took  their  part  was  marked  for  sig- 
nal political  vengeance.  Whoever  crossed  the  dead-line  fell.  No  scheme  that 
could  be  devised  to  injure  the  trade,  or  harbors  and  vessels  of  Massachusetts, 
was  overlooked.  Among  others,  a  bill  was  passed, — February  10,  1775, — by 
which  Massachusetts,  Rhode  Island,  and  Connecticut  were  restricted  in  their 
trade  to  Great  Britain,  and  its  possessions  in  the  East  Indies.  The  poor  col- 
onists weie  prohibited  from  fishing  on  the  banks  of  Newfoundland.  This  was 
a  starvation  act.  It  was  known  that  the  hardy  inhabitants  of  New  England 
had  ventured  forth  in  large  numbers  on  those  fishing  grounds,  to  drag  from  the 
reluctant  deep  the  means  of  subsistence  which  they  could  hardly  wring  from 
an  ungenial  soil.  It  was  believed  that  this  act  would  starve  New  England 
men  into  submission.  But  none  of  these  measures  produced  any  such  result, 
but  exactly  the  contrary.  The  feeling  had  become  universal,  that  they  must 
throw  themselves  upon  their  own  resources,  and  defy  the  power  of  the  King. 

The  First  Blood  of  the  Revolution  shed  at  Lexington. — The  Provincial 

•  Pitt  had  already  said,  '  I  rejoice  that  America  has  said  without  doors  of  the  strength  of  America.     It  is  a 

resisted;   if  its  millions  of  inhabitants  had    submitted  topic  that  ought  to  be  cautiously  meddled  with.     In  a 

taxes  would  soon  have  been  laid  on  Ireland,  and  if  ever  good  cause,  on  a  sound  bottom,  the  force  of  this  coun- 

this  nation   should   have  a  tyrant  for  its  king,  six  mil-  try  can  crush  America  to  atoms.     .     .     .     But  on  this 

lions  of  freemen,  so  dead  to  all  the  feelings  of  liberty  as  ground  of  the  stamp-act  when  so  many  here  will  think 

voluntarily  to  submit  to  be  slaves  would   be  fit  instru-  it  a  crying  injustice,  I  am  one  who  will  lift  up  my  hands 

ments  to  make  slaves  of  the  rest.     The  gentleman  asks  against  it.     In  such  a  cause  your  success  would  be 

when  were  the    colonies    emancipated?      I    desire  to  hazardous.      America,  tf  she  fell,  would  fall  like  the 

know  when  they  were  made  slaves.     Lord  Bacon  has  strong  man  ;  she  would  embrace  the  pillars  of  the  state, 

told  me   hat  a  great  question  will  not  fail  of  being  agi-  and  pull  down  the  constitution  along  with  her.' 
tated  at  one  time  or  another.    A  gnat  deal  has  been 


FIRST  BLOOD  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.  249 

Assembly  had  ordered  military  stores  to  be  collected  j  and  the  further  enlisting 
of  militia  and  minute-men,  and  their  practice  for  improvement  in  fire-arms 
was  encouraged.  General  Gage  sent  an  armed  force  to  Salem  to  take  posses- 
sion of  several  field-pieces  in  the  name  of  the  King.  But  the  people  pulled 
up  the  draw-bridge,  and  repulsed  the  soldiers.  A  quantity  of  military  st  jres 
had  been  collected  at  the  little  village  of  Concord,  and  a  detachment  of  800 
men  under  Colonel  Smith  and  Major  Pitcairn  was  sent  by  General  Gage  to 
seize  or  destroy  them.  When  the  detachment  reached  the  village  of  Lexing- 
ton, they  found  the  militia  of  the  place  drawn  up.1  Pitcairn,  with  a  portion  of 
the  detachment,  approached  within  musket  shot  and  exclaimed  :  '  Ye  villains, 
ye  rebels  ! '  '  Disperse  ! '  *  Lay  down  your  arms  ! '  '  Why  don't  you  lay  down 
your  arms  ? '  Seeing  that  his  orders  were  not  obeyed,  he  gave  the  word  to 
fire.  Eight  Lexington  men  were  killed,  and  ten  wounded,  and  the  militia 
were  dispersed.9  Flushed  with  this  little  success,  the  detachment  marched 
on  to  Concord,  destroying,  or  taking  possession  of  such  portions  of  the  stores 
as  they  could.  But  they  had  penetrated  into  the  interior  as  far  as  they  deemed 
prudent,  and  the  commanding  officer  ordered  a  retreat  to  Boston. s  At  Lex- 
ington, he  was  joined  by  Lord  Percy,  who  brought  with  him  reinforcements 
of  nearly  1,000  men.  On  the  long  march  they  were  pressed  hard  by  the 
provincial  soldiers.  From  every  thicket  and  from  behind  every  wall  and 
building  the  bullets  flew,  carrying  destruction  with  them.  Towards  evening, 
after  a  hard  march  of  thirty  miles,  the  King's  soldiers  passed  Charlestown 
Neck,  and  encamped  on  Bunker's  Hill  for  the  night.  The  next  morning,  under 
the  protection  of  a  British  man-of-war,  they  entered  Boston. 

The  Tocsin  of  the  Revolution. — The  die  was  now  cast.  The  blood  of 
Americans  had  been  shed  by  the  King  of  England,  and  from  that  hour  his 
dominion  in  America  passed  away.  The  news  flew  in  every  direction.  Horses 
were  taken  from  the  fields,  and  mounted  by  men  who  drove  them  till  they 
dropped  dead.     All  over  the  hills  and  down  on  the  valleys  of  New  England 

1  The  work  so  worthy  of  commemoration — the  com-  agreements — to  meet  such  an  exigence  ;  who  had  been 
mencement  of  the  war  of  the  American  Rhvolu-  disciplined  to  meet  it,  who  were  expected  to  meet  it, 
tion — cannot  be  satisfactorily  accounted  for,  without  and  who  had  been  warned  that  it  was  close  at  hand, 
taking  into  view  previous  efforts.  Nothing  is  clearer  They  were  the  minute-men.  It  is  enough  to  say,  that 
than  that  it  obeyed  the  great  law  of  production.  It  they  came  so  near  up  to  their  own  ideal  of  hazardous 
was  the  result  of  labor.  It  took  the  people  years  of  de-  duty,  and  to  the  high  expectation  of  their  fellow-pa- 
liberation  to  arrive  at  the  point  of  forcible  resistance  ;  triots,  as  to  win  praise  from  friend  and  foe.  They  did 
and  after  this  point  had  been  reached,  it  took  months  a  thorough,  a  necessary,  and  an  immortal  work.  They 
of  steady  preparation  to  meet  such  a  crisis  worthily,  should  have  the  credit  of  it.  This  battle  should  be 
This  crisis  did  not  come  unexpected,  nor  was  it  left  to  called  the  battle  of  the  minute-men."— Frothing- 
shift  for  itself  when  it  did  come.     The  leading  patriots  ham's  Siege  of  Beston,  pp.  83-84. 

were  not  quite  so  dull  and  rash  as  to  leave  this  unpro-  a  Samuel  Adams  heard  the  volley  of  musketry  at 

vided  for.     They  were  men  of  sound  common  sense,  Lexington  that  commenced  the  war  of  the  Re\olution. 

who  well  discerned   the  signs  of  the  times.      If  they  It  was   in  view  of  the  inevitable  train  of  consequences 

trusted  to  the  inherent  goodness  of  their  cause,  they  tha't  would  result  from  this,  that  he  exclaimed, 'O,  what 

also  looked  sharp  to  have  their  powder  dry.  Individual  a  glorious  morning  is  this  ! ' 

volunteers,  it  is  true,  appeared  on  this  day  on  the  field.  3  Washington  writes,  May  31,  1775  :  4  If  the  re- 
But  still  the  power  that  was  so  successful  against  a  treat  had  not  been  as  precipitate  as  it  was, — and  God 
bod  •  of  British  veterans  of  undoubted  bravery,  finely  knows  it  could  not  well  have  been  more  so, — the  minis- 
officered  and  finely  disciplined,  that  twice  put  them  in  terial  troops  must  have  surrendered,  or  been  totally  cut 
imminent  peril  of  entire  capture,  was  not  an  armed  off.  For  they  had  not  arrived  in  Charlestown  (under 
mob,  made  up  of  individuals,  who,  on  a  new-born  im-  cover  of  their  ships),  half  an  hour  before  a  powerful 
pulse,  aroused  by  the  sudden  sound  of  the  tocsin,  body  of  men  from  Marblehead  and  Salem  was  at  their 
seized  their  rusty  firelocks,  and  rushed  to  the  'tented  heels,  and  must,  if  they  had  happened  to  be  up  one 
field.'  But  it  was  an  organized  power,  made  up  of  hour  sooner,  inevitably  have  intercepted  their  retreat  to 
militia  who  had  associated  themselves — often  by  written  Charlestown.' — Sharks'   Washington,  vol.  ii.  p.  407. 


250  CAPTURE  OF  TICONDEROGA  AND  CROWN  POINT. 

the  cry  was  rung :  '  The  war  has  begun  !     To  arms  /     Liberty  or  Death  ! 
and  everywhere  men  seemed  to  rise  up  as  though  they  had  sprung  from  the 
bowels  of  the  earth.     Thus  sounded  the  tocsin  of  the  Revolution. 

The  skirmishes  of  Concord  and  Lexington  had  cost  the  British  273,  and 
the  Americans  88  men.  But  the  significance  of  those  events  could  by  no 
means  be  measured  by  the  number  of  men  who  fell.  Battles  have  been  fought^ 
where  tens  of  thousands  have  strewn  the  field,  to  which  history  attaches  few 
important  consequences.  But  from  that  day  of  blood,  the  destinies  of  the 
New  World  were  decided.  The  time  for  general  and  decided  action  had  fully 
come.  The  Legislatures  of  the  several  Colonies  assembled  immediately,  and 
took  the  government  into  their  own  hands.  Troops  were  raised  in  every  part 
of  the  country,  and  in  a  short  time  an  army  of  16,000  had  collected  in  the 
neighborhood  of  Boston.  General  Gage  was  besieged  within  the  town,  and 
all  his  supplies  cut  off,  except  those  which  came  by  sea.  The  Colonists  had 
changed  the  attitude  of  defence  for  that  of  aggression. 

Capture  of  Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point. — The  military  ardor  of  the  army, 
mconstructed  though  it  was,  kindled  at  any  aggressive  movement  that  was  pro- 
posed. The  boldest  of  these  plans  was  to  seize  the  strong  fortresses  of  Ticon- 
deroga and  Crown  Point,  and  they  were  executed  chiefly  by  Connecticut  and 
Vermont  Volunteers,  under  the  command  of  Colonel  Ethan  Allen,  and  Bene- 
dict Arnold.1  This  achievement  was  attended  with  important  consequences, 
for  the  spoils  of  victory  taken  at  these  two  important  posts,  consisting  of  nearly 
150  pieces  of  cannon,  and  a  large  supply  of  stores  and  ammunition,  which  not 
only  weakened  the  enemy,  but  greatly  enforced  the  patriots.  J  A  few  months 
later,  March,  1776,  some  of  the  cannons,'  says  Lossing,  'were  hurling  death 
shots  into  the  midst  of  the  British  troops  in  Boston.' 

Patrick  Henry  in  the  Virginia  Convention. — On  the  20th  of  March,  1775, 
a  Convention  of  delegates  from  the  several  counties  and  corporations  of  Vir- 
ginia, met  for  the  second  time.  Patrick  Henry  uttered  that  wonderful  harangue 
which  is  thus  characterized  by  Wirt :  '  The  gulf  of  war  which  yawned  before 
him  was  indeed  fiery  and  fearful ;  but  he  saw  that  the  awful  plunge  was  inevit- 
able. The  body  of  the  Convention,  however,  hesitated.  They  cast  around 
a  longing,  lingering  look  on  those  flowery  fields  on  which  peace,  and  ease, 
and  joy  were  still  sporting ;  and  it  required  all  the  energies  of  a  Mentor  like 

1  Some  Connecticut  men,  knowing  the  importance  was  almost  sure  to  be  done.   These  bold  leaders  grasped 

of  Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point  for  military  purposes,  the  hands  of  the  Connecticut  men,  the  expedition  was 

bad  borrowed  1,800  dollars  from  the  Legislature,  and  soon  ready,  and  marched  under  Allen, 
marched   to  Burlington  to  get  the  aid  of  the   Green  Having  taken  possession  of  the  fort  and  garrison  by 

Mountain  boys.     This  was  the  name  given  to  a  band  of  surprise,  Allen  mounted  to  the  door  of  the  commandant's 

hardy  pioneers  who  had  settled  in  Vermont,  and  built  up  apartments.     Captain  De  La  Place  was  roused  from 

for  themselves  quiet  and  secure  homes  in  the  forest.  So  his  bed  by  heavy  blows  from  the  hilt  of  Allen's  sword 

brilliant  was  the  part  they  played  in  the  Revolution,  He  rushed  to  the  door,  followed  by  his  wife,  and  re- 

that  their  daring  and  intrepidity  won  the  admiration  of  cognizing  Allen,    asked,    '  What  do  you  want  ?  '     'I 

the  world.    Their  leaders  were  Colonels  Ethan  Allen,  want  you   to   surrender  this  fort,'  was  Allen's  reply. 

»nd  Seth  Warner ;  two  men  so  brave  and  determined,  'By  what  authority   do  you  demand  it?'  asked  the 

so  completely  masters  of  the  woods  and  fields,  and  so  commander.    'By  the  authority  of  the  Great  Jehovah, 

thoroughly  trained  in  border  conflicts,  and  the  hard-  and  the  Continental  Congress,'  said  Allen,  with  a  voico 

fought  battles  of  the  French  war,  that,  under  their  guid-  of  thunder.     The  captain  at  once  surrendered. 
ance,  whatever  the  Green  Mountain  boys  undertook, 


MECKLENBERG  DECLARATION  OF  INDEPENDENCE.      25! 

Henry,  to  push  them  from  the  precipice,  and  conduat  them  over  the  stormy 
sea  of  the  Revolution,  to  liberty  and  glory.'1 

The  Mecklenb erg  Declaration  of  Independence,  May,  1775. — While  th<« 
spring  grass  was  starting  over  the  graves  of  the  first  patriotic  martyrs  who 
had  fallen  on  the  village  green  of  Lexington,  and  a  month  before  the  blood) 
day  of  Bunker  Hill,  an  event  was  transpiring  in  North  Carolina  which  will 
reflect  lustre  upon  that  State  as  long  as  the  name  of  America  shall  endure. 
Thoroughly  in  sympathy  with  the  revolutionary  movement,  and  with  a  matu- 
rity of  political  judgment  which  seemed  more  like  a  divine  inspiration  than  a 
simple  process  of  reasoning,  a  series  of  Resolutions  was  adopted  by  a  Con- 
vention of  delegates,  chosen  by  the  people  of  North  Carolina,  assembled  at 
Charlotte,  in  Mecklenberg  County.  These  Twenty  Resolutions,  for  which  the 
people  of  that  State,  in  the  name  of  their  ancestors,  claim  what  we  so  readily 
accord  to  them,  the  combined  glory  of  prophets  and  pioneers,  was  virtually 
a  Declaration  of  Independence  ;  for  they  were  adopted  more  than  a  year  be- 
fore the  Great  Declaration  at  Philadelphia. 

This  was  the  boldest  act  of  treason  which  had  yet  been  perpetrated.  It 
seemed  to  spring  spontaneously  from  the  heart  of  the  people.  It  had  bor- 
rowed no  military  inspiration,  except  from  the  skirmishes  of  Lexington  and 
Concord  ;  and  the  tone  of  the  Charlotte  Resolutions,  with  the  dignified  asser- 
tion, of  their  rights  as  free  men,  startled  and  amazed  the  most  sanguine  and 
determined  patriots  in  every  quarter  where  the  intelligence  reached.  It  was 
the  first  formal  and  deliberate  declaration  that  the  American  people  were  ab- 
solved from  all  allegiance  to  the  British  crown. 

Many  readers  are  doubtless  aware -that  a  claim  to  still  higher  merit  than 
had  been  accorded,  was  made  a  few  years  ago  in  connection  with  this  so-called 

1  Let  us  not— said  Henry— I  beseech  you,  sir,  de-  net  weak  if  we  make  a  proper  use  of  those  means  which 

ceive  ourselves  longer.     Sir,  we  have  done  everything  the  God  of  nature  hath  placed  in  our  power.     Three 

that  could  be  done  to  avert  the  storm  which  is  now  millions  of  people  armed  in  the  holy  cause  of  liberty, 

coming  on.    We  have  petitioned.     We  have  remon-  and  in  such  a  country  as  that  which  we  possess,  are 

strated — we  have  supplicated — we  have  prostrated  our-  invincible  by  any  force  which  our  enemy  can   send 

selves  before  the  throne,  and  have  implored  its  interpo-  against  us.     Besides,  sir,  we  shall  not  fight  our  battles 

sition  to  arrest  the  tyrannical  hands  of  the  ministry  alone.     There  is  a  just  God  who  presides  over  the  des- 

and  parliament     Our  petitions   have   been   slighted  :  tinies  of  nations,  and  who  will  raise  up  friends  to  fight 

our  remonstrances  have  produced  additional  violence  our  battle  for  us.     The  battle,  sir,  is  not  to  the  strong 

and  insult ;  our  supplications  have  been  disregarded  ;  alone,  it  is  to  the  vigilant,  the  active,  the  brave.     Be- 

and  we  have  been  spurned,  with  contempt,  from  the  foot  sides,  sir,  we  have  no  election.    If  we  were  base  enough 

of  the  throne.     In  vain,  after  these  things,  may  we  in-  to  desire  it,  it  is  now  too  late  to  retire  from  the  contest, 

dulge  the  fond  hope  of  peace  and  reconciliation.   There  There  is  no  retreat  but  in  submission  and  slavery  !  Our 

is  no  longer  any  room  for  hope.     If  we  wish  to  be  free —  chains  are  forged.     Their  clanking  may  be  heard  on 

if  we  mean  to  preserve  inviolate  those  inestimable  pri-  the  plains  of  Boston  !    The  war  is  inevitable — and  let 

vileges  for  which  we  have  been  so  long  contending — if  it  come  ! !     I  repeat  it,  sir,  let  it  come  ! ! ! 
we  mean  not  basely  to  abandon  the  noble  struggle  in  It  is  in  vain,  sir,  to  extenuate  the  matter.     Gentle- 

which  we  have  been  so  long  engaged,  and  which  we  men  may  cry  peace,  peace — but  there  is  no  peace.   The 

have  pledged  ourselves  never  to  abandon  until  the  glo-  war  is  actually  begun  !   The  next  gale  that  sweeps  from 

rious  object  of  our  contest  shall  be  obtained — we  must  the  North  will  bring  to  our  ears  the  clash  of  resounding 

fight !     I  repeat  it,  sir,  we  must  fight !     An  appeal  to  arms  ?     Our  brethren  are  already  in  the  field  !     Why 

arms  and  to  the  God  of  hosts,  is  all  that  is  left  us  !  stand  we  here  idle  ?    What  is  it  that  gentlemen  wish  ? 

They  tell  us,    sir — continued  Henry— that  we  are  What  would  they  have?     Is  life  so  dear,  or  peace  so 

weak — unable  to  cope  with  so  formidable  an  adversary!  sweet,  as  to  be  purchased  at  the  price  of  chains  and 

But  when  shall  we  be  stronger?     Will  it  be  the  next  slavery?     Forbid  it,  Almighty  God  !     I  know  not  what 

week,  or  the  next  year?     Will  it  be  when  we  are  totally  course  others  may  take  ;  but  as  for  me,  cried  he,  with 

disarmed,  and  when  a  British  guard  shall  be  stationed  both  his  arms  extended  aloft,  his  brows  knit,  every  fea- 

in  every  house?     Shall  we  gather  strength  by  irreso-  ture  marked  with  a  resolute  purpose  of  his  soul, and  hU 

lution  and  inaction  ?     Shall  we  acquire  the  means  of  voice  swelled  to  its  boldest  note  of  exclamation — '  Giv* 

effectual  resistance  by  lying  supinely  on  our  backs,  and  me  liberty  or  give    me  death!' — Wirt's  Henry, 

hugging  the  delusive  phantom  of  hope,  until  our  ene-  pp.  139-142.  -  • 

niies  shall  have  bound  us  hand  and  foot  ?     Sir,  we  are 


252  PREPARA  TJONS  FOR  BA  TTLE. 

Mecklenberg  Declaration  of  Independence  :  but  I  do  not  deem  it  worthy  of 
any  further  attention  here.  We  never  can  grow  too  familiar  with  the  State 
Papers  drawn  up  by  the  Fathers  of  the  Republic,  nor  with  the  Resolutions 
adopted  at  popular  meetings,  and  deliberative  conventions.  They  all  breathe 
the  same  spirit ;  and  to  claim  any  great  superiority  for  the  patriots  of  one 
section  over  those  of  another,  is  to  make  a  distinction  where  none  exists. 
There  was  glory  enough  for  them  all.  I  would  as  soon  think  of  claiming  pre- 
cedence for  one  section  of  the  sky  at  the  daybreak,  because  it  radiated  more 
light  from  the  advancing  sun.  The  collision  with  the  British  troops  took 
place  first,  where  they  had  been  stationed  to  overawe  and  make  aggressions 
upon  the  people.  The  first  great  irruption  was  at  Boston.  The  speech  of 
Patrick  Henry  in  the  House  of  Burgesses,  came  nearer  to  the  language  of 
treason  than  any  uttered  even  by  James  Otis  himself;  while  in  a  distant  and 
obscure  State,  and  one  which  had  not  hitherto  been  distinguished,  the  first 
clear  declaration  was  made,  by  a  deliberative  body,  of  absolution  from  allegi- 
ance to  the  King  of  England.  The  simple  truth  was  that  the  rising  sun  of 
liberty  was  shedding  his  beams  over  all  the  land,  and  fires  were  to  be  kindled 
which  were  never  to  go  out.  At  the  same  time  the  Governors  of  North  and 
South  Carolina,  finding  it  impossible  to  repress  the  rising  spirit,  abandoned 
their  posts  and  took  refuge  under  the  British  flag. 

Gage  prepares  for  Battle. — As  Boston  was  now  the  chief  point  of  military 
interest,  and  the  British  had  received  large  reinforcements  from  England, 
under  Generals  Howe,  Burgoyne,  and  Clinton,  it  was  the  first  point  upon 
which  the  Provincial  Congress  recommended  the  council  of  war  to  concen- 
trate their  forces.  Martial  law  was  proclaimed  throughout  Massachusetts  by 
General  Gage ;  but  a  pardon  was  offered  to  all  rebels  who  would  return  to 
their  allegiance,  with  the  two  exceptions  of  Samuel  Adams  and  John  Hancock. 
These  exceptions  were  made  with  discrimination.  They  had  gone  too  far  to 
be  pardoned,  and  they  could  not  be  corrupted  by  gold  or  power.1  Deter- 
mined to  bring  things  to  an  issue,  and  crush  the  rebellion,  the  Commander-in- 
Chief  offered  to  allow  the  people  of  Boston  to  leave  the  town.  But  when  he 
saw  that  nearly  the  entire  population  were  starting,  he  revoked  the  permission, 
and  compelled  most  of  them  to  remain. 

The  Day  of  Bunker  Hill. — The  sun  never  heralded  a  more  beautiful 
morning  than  that  of  the  17th  day  of  June,  1775,  since  he  first  dawned  upon 
Paradise.  No  cloud  hung  over  Boston  throughout  that  day  except  the  cloud  of 
battle.  During  the  previous  night,  Prescott's  thousand  men  had  been  working 
on  Breed's  Hill,  near  Bunker's,  with  axes,  crowbars,  picks,  and  shovels,  to 
construct  the  redoubt  against  which  the  repeated  charges  of  the  British  bat- 

1  A  few  days  before  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill  a  par-  tended   their  fame.      A  few  others,  it  is  well  known, 

don  was  offered  to  all  rebels  except  Samuel  Adams  and  were  secretly  proscribed,  and  would    doubtless  hava 

John  Hancock — '  whose  offences,'  said  the  edict,  '  are  of  fallen  victims   to  ministerial  vengeance;  but  Adana 

too  flagitious  a  nature  to  admit  of  any  other  considera-  and  Hancock  were  the  only  two  expressly  except  ;d 

tion  than  that  of  condign  punishment.'  This  virulent  pro  from  all  hope  of  pardon,  and  irrevocably  denounced.  — 

scription,  which  was  intended  to  ruin  them,  widely  ex-  Tudor's  Otist  p.  264. 


SAMUEL   ADAMS. 


THE  DAY  OF  BUNKER  HILL.  253 

talions  were  to  be  so  resolutely  made.1  The  labor  had  been  conducted  with 
such  silence  and  dispatch,  that,  when  the  morning  light  unmasked  the  works, 
the  English  saw  a  strong  redoubt,  indicating  a  determination  to  stand  the 
ground  and  meet  the  enemy.  The  Americans  had  now  to  contend  with  a 
heavy  cannonade  from  the  battle-ships  in  the  river.  But  as  this  did  not  disturb 
their  operations,  General  Gage  sent  three  thousand  men  under  Howe  and 
Pigot,  from  Boston  in  boats,  and  landed  them  under  the  guns  of  the  vessels  at 
Charlestown.  Here  they  called  into  requisition  the  most  malignant  agency 
of  war,  setting  fire  to  the  town  j a  and  while  the  screams  of  the  tender,  the 
aged,  the  old,  and  the  helpless,  were  mingling  with  the  sheets  of  flame  that 
wrapped  their  habitations,  the  British  advanced  to  the  attack.  The  Ameri- 
cans being  short  of  ammunition  had,  under  orders,  reserved  their  fire  until  the 
attacking  column  was  within  ten  rods  of  the  redoubt,8  when  they  levelled  their 
muskets  and  poured  down  a  hail  of  death  into  the  bosom  of  the  British  army. 
Every  bullet  did  its  work.  Whole  battalions  melted,  and  many  officers  of  rank 
fell.  Twice  had  they  been  repulsed  when  Clinton  came  up.  He  once  more 
rallied  his  men,  who  fought  as  Englishmen  had  been  fighting  for  a  thotisand 
years,  loyally  under  orders,  whether  taking  aim  at  friend  or  foe.  The  attack 
under  Clinton  was  made  on  the  redoubt  on  three  sides,  and  the  onset  was  all 
but  irresistible.  At  last  the  ammunition  of  the  Americans  gave  out.4  There 
was  but  one  road,  and  that  was  across  Charlestown  Neck,  where  a  shower  of 
balls  fell  upon  them  from  the  British  vessels,  and  one  of  them  struck  Major- 
General  Joseph  Warren  and  he  fell  dead. 

The  name  of  Daniel  Webster  is  as  imperishably  connected  with  Bunker 
Hill  as  that  of  Joseph  Warren,  its  immortal  hero  :  and  as  neither  can  be  men- 
tioned alone,  when  that  first  great  conflict  of  the  War  for  Independence  is 
spoken  of,  it  seems  proper  to  give  the  reflections  of  the  statesman  on  that 

1  In  The  History  of  the  Siege  of  Boston,  by  Rich-  peninsula,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  in  the  neighbor- 

ard   Frothingham,    Jr.,   an   exhaustive  essay  on   the  hood  of  Mill  street,  were  entirely  consumed.   Thenum- 

whole  subject  of  the  battles  of  I>exington,  Concord,  and  ber  of  buildings  was  estimated  at  about  four  hundred  ; 

Bunker  Hill,  the  author  says  :  'Colonel  Prescott,  there-  and  the  loss  of  property  at  ^117,982,  5s.  2d. — Siege  of 

fore,  was  the  only  regular  commander  of  the  party  who  Boston,  p.  203. 

fortified  Breed's  Hill.  .  .  .  When  General  Warren,  for  3  The  Americans   coolly  awaited   their  approach  ; 

instance,   entered  the  redoubt,  Colonel  Prescott  ten-  their    officers    ordered    them    to    reserve     their    fire 

dered  him  the  command  ;  but  Warren  replied  that  he  until  the  British  were  v/ithin  ten  or  twelve  rods,  and 

had    not  received   his — [he  had   been   appointed   by  then   wait  until   the  word  was  given.     Powder  was 

Massachusetts   a     Major-General] — commission,   and  scarce  and  must  not  be  wasted.   They  said  '  fire  low  ;  * 

would  serve  as  a  volunteer.     He  mingled  in  the  fight,  '  aim  at  the  waist  ba»ds  ; '   •  wait  until  you  see  the 

behaved  with  great  bravery,  and   was  among  the  last  white  of  their  eyes  ;  *  'aim  at  the  handsome  coats; ' 

to  leave  the  redoubt  :  he  was  lingering  even  to  rash-  'pick  off  the  commanders.'     '  Men,'  exclaimed  Put- 

ness  in  his  retreat.' — Siege  of  Boston,  p.  166.  nam,  'you  are  all  marksmen  ;  do  not  one  of  you  fire 

3  General  Burgoyne's  Letter  supplies  the  most  au-  until  you  see  the  white  of  their  eyes.'— Siege  of  Bos- 

thentic  description  of  the  burning  of  the  town.     He  ton. 

writes  of  the  British  columns  as  they  were  moving  to  *  '  But  the  defenders  had  spent  their  ammunition  : 

the  attack  :   'They   were    also   exceedingly  hurt  by  another  cannon-cartridge    furnishing  the   powder   for 

musketry  from  Charlestown,  though  Clinton  and  I  did  the   last  muskets  that  were   fired,  and  its  substitute 

not  perceive  it  till  Howe  sent  us  word  by  a  boat,  and  stones,  revealed  their  weakness  and  filled   the  enemy 

desired  us  to  set  fire  to  the  town,  which  was  imme-  with  hope.     The  redoubt  was  soon  successfully  scaled. 

diately  done  ;  we  threw  a  parcel  of  shells,,  and  General  Pigot,  by  the  aid  of  a  tree,  mounted  the  cor- 

the  whole  was  immedi atei.y  in  flames.'  ner  of  it,  and  was  closely  followed  by  his  men,  when 

The  town  was  burning  on  the  second  attack.     The  one  side   of  it  literally  bristled  with   bayonets.     The 

smoke  was  seen  a  great  distance.     'Terrible  indeed  conflict   was  now  carried   on   hand   to   hand.     Many 

was  the  scene' — a  letter  from  Salem  reads, — 'even  at  stood  and  received  wounds  with  swords  and  bayonets  ; 

our  distance.      The  western  horizon  in  the  day   time  but  the  British  continued  to  enter,  and  were  advanc- 

was  one  huge  body  of  smoke,  and  in  the  evening  a  ing  towards    the   Americans   when   Colonel   Prescott 

continued  blaze  ;  and  the  perpetual  sound  of  cannon  gave  the  order  to  retreat.' —History  of  the  Siege  of 

and  volleys  of  musketry  worked  up  our  imaginations  Boston,  p.  150. 
to  a  high  degree  of  fright.'     The  houses  within  the 


254  WEBSTER'S  DESCRIPTION  OF  THE  BATTLE. 

memorable  battle1 : — '  No  national  drama  was  ever  developed  in  a  more 
interesting  and  splendid  first  scene.  The  incidents  and  the  result  of  the  bat 
tie  itself  were  most  important,  and  indeed  most  wonderful.  As  a  mere  battle, 
few  surpass  it  in  whatever  engages  and  interests  attention.  It  was  fought  on 
a  conspicuous  eminence,  in  the  immediate  neighborhood  of  a  populous  city, 
and  consequently  in  the  view  of  thousands  of  spectators.  The  attacking  party 
moved  over  a  sheet  of  water  to  the  assault.  The  operations  and  movements 
were  of  course  all  visible  and  all  distinct.  Those  who  looked  on  from  the 
houses  and  heights  of  Boston  had  a  fuller  view  of  every  important  operation 
and  event  than  can  ordinarily  be  had  of  any  battle,  or  than  can  possibly  be 
had  of  such  as  are  fought  on  a  more  extended  ground,  or  by  detachments  of 
troops  acting  in  different  places,  and  at  different  times,  and  in  some  measure 
independently  of  each  other.  When  the  British  columns  were  advancing 
to  the  attack,  the  flames  of  Charlestown — fired,  as  is  generally  supposed,  by 
a  shell — began  to  ascend.  The  spectators,  far  outnumbering  both  armies, 
thronged  and  crowded  on  every  height  and  every  point  which  afforded  a  view 
of  the  scene,  themselves  constituting  a  very  important  part  of  it. 

'  The  troops  of  the  two  armies  seemed  like  so  many  combatants  in  an  am- 
phitheatre. The  manner  in  which  they  should  acquit  themselves  was  to  be 
judged  of,  not,  as  in  other  cases  of  military  engagements,  by  reports  and  future 
history,  but  by  a  vast  and  anxious  assembly  already  on  the  spot,  and  waiting 
with  unspeakable  concern  and  emotion  the  progress  of  the  day. 

*  In  other  battles  the  recollection  of  wives  and  children  has  been  used  as 
an  excitement  to  animate  the  warrior's  breast,  and  nerve  his  arm.  Here  was 
not  a  mere  recollection,  but  an  actual  presence  of  them,  and  other  dear  con- 
nections, hanging  on  the  skirts  of  the  battle,  anxious  and  agitated,  feeling 
almost  as  if  wounded  themselves  by  every  blow  of  the  enemy,  and  putting  forth, 
as  it  were,  their  own  strength,  and  all  the  energy  of  their  own  throbbing 
bosoms,  into  every  gallant  effort  of  their  warring  friends. 

'  But  there  was  a  more  comprehensive  and  vastly  more  important  view  01 
that  day's  contest  than  has  been  mentioned, — a  view,  indeed,  which  ordinary 
eyes,  bent  intently  on  what  was  immediately  before  them,  did  not  embrace, 
but  which  was  perceived  in  its  full  extent  and  expansion  by  minds  of  a  higher 
order.  Those  men  who  were  at  the  head  of  the  Colonial  Councils,  who  had 
been  engaged  for  years  in  the  previous  stages  of  the  quarrel  with  England, 
and  who  had  been  accustomed  to  look  forward  to  the  future,  were  well  ap- 
prised of  the  magnitude  of  the  events  likely  to  hang  on  the  business  of  the  day. 
They  saw  in  it,  not  only  a  battle,  but  the  beginning  of  a  civil  war  of  unmea- 
sured extent  and  uncertain  issue.  All  America,  and  all  England  were  likely 
to  be  deeply  concerned  in  the  consequences.  The  individuals  themselves, 
who  knew  full  well  what  agency  they  had  in  bringing  affairs  to  the  crisis,  had 
need  of  all  their  courage — not  that  disregard  of  personal  safety  in  which  the  vul- 

1  I  quote  from  an  Article  contributed  to  the  North  tive  of  how  colossal  a  work  Webster  might  have  writ" 

A merican  Review,  vol.  vii.,  which  is  believed  to  be  the  ten   about    this    nation,   had   the   Muse    of    Histiry 

only  Kterary  contribution  ever  made  by  him  to  that  or  beguiled  him  from  the  Senate  and  the  Cabinet, 
any  other  quarterly  or  monthly  periodical.     It  is  sugges- 


FIFTY  YEARS  AFTER  THE  BATTLE.  255 

gar  suppose  true  courage  to  consist,  but  that  high  and  fixed  moral  sentiment, 
that  steady  and  decided  purpose,  which  enables  men  to  pursue  a  distant  end, 
with  a  full  view  of  the  difficulties  and  dangers  before  them,  and  with  a  con 
viction  that,  before  they  must  arrive  at  the  proposed  end,  should  they  ever 
reach  it,  they  must  pass  through  evil  report  as  well  as  good  report,  and  be 
liable  to  obloquy  as  well  as  defeat. 

*  Spirits  that  fear  nothing  else,  fear  disgrace ;  and  this  danger  is  necessar- 
ily encountered  by  those  who  engage  in  civil  war.  Unsuccessful  resistance  is 
not  only  ruin  to  its  authors,  but  is  esteemed,  and  necessarily  so,  by  the  laws 
of  all  countries,  treasonable.  This  is  the  case,  at  least,  till  resistance  becomes 
so  general  and  formidable  as  to  assume  the  form  of  regular  war.  But  whc 
can  tell  when  resistance  commences,  whether  it  will  attain  even  to  that  degree 
of  success  ?  Some  of  those  persons  who  signed  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence, in  1776,  described  themselves  as  signing  it  'as  with  halters  about  their 
necks.'  If  there  were  grounds  for  this  remark  in  1776,  when  the  cause  had 
become  so  much  more  general,  how  much  greater  was  the  hazard  when  the 
battle  of  Bunker  Hill  was  fought  ! 

1  These  considerations  constituted,  to  enlarged  and  liberal  minds,  the 
moral  sublimity  of  the  occasion  ;  while  to  the  outward  senses,  the  movement 
of  armies,  the  roar  of  artillery,  the  brilliancy  of  the  reflection  of  a  summer's  sun 
from  the  burnished  armor  of  the  British  columns,  and  the  flames  of  a  burning 
town,  made  up  a  scene  of  extraordinary  grandeur.'  ■ 

Fifty  years  after  the  Battle. — Half  a  century  had  passed  since  the  smoke 
of  battle  rolled  from  Bunker  Hill,  when  the  corner  stone  of  an  obelisk  which 
now  ■  meets  the  sun  in  his  coming '  was  to  be  laid.  A  vast  multitude  stood  on 
the  holy  ground  with  the  heavens  over  their  heads  and  beneath  their  feet  the 
bones  of  their  fathers.  What  more  appropriate  place  than  this,  for  those  won- 
derful words  which  were  addressed  to  the  shattered  remnants  of  the  patriot 
army  which  met  the  first  shock  of  the  Revolution. 

Daniel  Webster  said  : — '  Venerable  Men  !  You  have  come  down  to  us 
from  a  former  generation.  Heaven  has  bounteously  lengthened  out  your  lives, 
that  you  might  behold  this  joyous  day.  You  are  now  where  you  stood,  fifty 
years  ago,  this  very  hour,  with  your  brothers  and  your  neighbors,  shoulder 
to  shoulder,  in  the  strife  for  your  country.  Behold,  how  altered  !  The  same 
heavens  are  indeed  over  your  heads  ;  the  same  ocean  rolls  at  your  feet ;  but 
all  else,  how  changed  !  You  hear  now  no  roar  of  hostile  cannon,  you  see  no 
mixed  columns  of  smoke  and  flame  rising  from  burning  Charlestown.  The 
ground  strewed  with  the  dead  and  the  dying  ;  the  impetuous  charge  ;  the  steady 
and  successful  repulse  ;  the  loud  call  to  repeated  assault ;  the  summoning  of 
all  that  is  manly  to  repeated  resistance ;  a  thousand  bosoms  freely  and  fear- 

1  In   General  Burgoyne's   Letter  on   the  battle  of  ever  has,  or  can  be  more  dreadfully  terrible,  than  what 

Bunker  Hill,  quoted  in  the  North  American  Review,  was  to  be  seen  or  heard  at  this  time — the  most  inces- 

vol.  7,  page  226,  he   describes  the  scene  as  ■  a  compli-  sant  discharge  of  guns  that  ever  was  heard  with  mor- 

cation  of  horror  and  importance,  beyond  anything  that  tal  ears.' 
ever  came  to  my  lot  to  witness.     Sure  I  am,  nothing 


256  WEBSTER'S  BUNKER  HILL  ORATION. 

lessly  bared  in  an  instant  to  whatever  of  terror  there  may  be  in  war  and 
death ; — all  these  you  have  witnessed,  but  you  witness  them  no  more.  All  is 
peace.  The  heights  of  yonder  metropolis,  its  towers  and  roofs,  which  you  then 
saw  filled  with  wives  and  children  and  countrymen  in  distress  and  terror,  and 
looking  with  unutterable  emotions  for  the  issue  of  the  combat,  have  presented 
you  to-day,  with  the  sight  of  its  whole  happy  population,  come  out  to  welcome 
and  greet  you  with  a  universal  jubilee.  Yonder  proud  ships,  by  a  felicity  of 
position,  appropriately  lying  at  the  foot  of  this  mount,  and  seeming  fondly  to 
cling  around  it,  are  not  means  of  annoyance  to  you,  but  your  country's  own 
means  of  distinction  and  defence.  All  is  peace  ;  and  God  has  granted  you 
this  sight  of  your  country's  happiness,  ere  you  slumber  in  the  grave.  He  has 
allowed  you  to  behold  and  partake  the  reward  of  your  patriotic  toils  ;  and  he 
has  allowed  us,  your  sons  and  countrymen,  to  meet  you  here,  and  in  the  name 
of  the  present  generation,  in  the  name  of  your  country,  in  the  name  of  liberty, 
to  thank  you  ! 

■  But,  alas  !  You  are  not  all  here  !  Time  and  the  sword  have  thinned  your 
ranks !  Prescott,  Putnam,  Stark,  Brooks,  Read,  Pomeroy,  Bridge  !  our  eyes 
seek  for  you  in  vain  amid  this  broken  band.  You  are  gathered  to  your 
fathers,  and  live  only  to  your  country  in  her  grateful  remembrance,  and  your 
own  bright  example.  But  let  us  not  too  much  grieve  that  you  have  met  the 
common  fate  of  men.  You  lived  at  least  long  enough  to  know  that  your  work 
had  been  nobly  and  successfully  accomplished.  You  lived  to  see  your 
country's  independence  established,  and  to  sheath  your  swords  from  war. 
On  the  light  of  Liberty  you  saw  arise  the  light  of  Peace,  like 

*  another  morn, 
Risen  on  midnoon  ; ' 

and  the  sky  on  which  you  closed  your  eyes  was  cloudless. 

'But  ah  !  Him  !  the  first  great  martyr  in  this  great  cause  !  Him  !  the 
premature  victim  of  his  own  self-devoting  heart !  Him  !  the  head  of  our  civil 
councils,  and  the  destined  leader  of  our  military  bands,  whom  nothing  brought 
hither  but  the  unquenchable  fires  of  his  own  spirit !  Him  !  cut  off  by  Pro- 
vidence in  the  hour  of  overwhelming  anxiety  and  thick  gloom  ;  falling  ere  he 
saw  the  star  of  his  country  rise ;  pouring  out  his  generous  blood  like  water, 
before  he  knew  whether  it  would  fertilize  a  land  of  freedom  or  of  bondage  ! — 
how  shall  I  struggle  with  the  emotions  that  stifle  the  utterance  of  thy  name. 
Our  poor  work  may  perish ;  but  thine  shall  endure  !  This  monument  may 
moulder  away  ;  the  solid  ground  it  rests  upon  may  sink  down  to  a  level  with 
the  sea  ;  but  thy  memory  shall  not  fail !  Wheresoever  among  men  a  heart 
shall  be  found  that  beats  to  the  transports  of  patriotism  and  liberty,  its  aspira- 
tions shall  be  to  claim  kindred  with  thy  spirit ! ' 

Washington  appointed  Commander-in-Chief,  June  15,  1775. — From  the 
first  meeting  of  the  Continental  Congress  in  Philadelphia,  Sept.  5,  1874, 
George  Washington  had  held  a  seat  as  one  of  the  delegates  from  Virginia. 


WASHINGTON  APPOINTED  COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF.         257 

Aside  from  his  well-known  military  ability,  his  conduct  during  the  first  session 
had  deeply  impressed  that  august  assembly,  with  his  remarkable  talent  for 
business,  the  sagacity  of  his  judgment,  and  the  modest,  but  imposing  dignity 
of  his  character.     He  was  hereafter  to  move  in  other  scenes.1 

The  skirmish  at  Lexington  had  already  assumed  an  importance  wholly  dis- 
proportionate to  its  magnitude  as  a  military  event,  and  launched  the  country 
forward  with  the  irresistible  power  of  a  mountain  torrent.  The  crisis  which 
England  had  precipitated  left  no  other  choice' for  the  people  but  to  meet  it. 
Clouds  of  dust  from  the  hurrying  footsteps  of  horses  and  men  were  already 
rising  over  every  New  England  road  that  led  to  Boston.  A  future  filled  with 
doubtful  omens  was  opening  before  the  agitated  colonies,  and  although  un- 
certain of  their  fate,  yet  with  a  consciousness  of  deliberation  worthy  of  so  great 
an  occasion,  the  Continental  Congress,  now  in  its  second  session,  had  begun, 
with  a  wisdom  begotten  only  in  the  soberness  of  mature  counsels,  to  address 
itself  to  the  solemn  business  before  it.  The  time  had  come  to  organize  an 
army  and  choose  a  commander-in-chief.  On  the  14th  of  June,  John  Adams, 
in  a  brief  speech,  delineated  the  qualities  which  he  deemed  essential  in  the 
man  they  were  to  choose,  and  announced  his  intention  to  propose  for  that 
office  a  delegate  from  Virginia,  then  sitting  in  the  house.  It  was  well  under- 
stood to  whom  allusion  was  made ;  and  the  following  day  Thomas  Johnson, 
of  Maryland,  nominated  Colonel  Washington,  and  by  unanimous  vote  he  was 
elected.  With  the  same  unanimity,  and  at  the  same  time,  a  resolution  was 
passed  to  \  maintain  and  assist  him,  and  adhere  to  him  with  their  lives  and  for- 
tunes in  the  cause  of  American  liberty.'  3 

President  Hancock  announces  to  Washington  his  appoi?it?nent. — Over- 
whelmed with  the  responsibility  thus  rolled  upon  his  shoulders,  the  modesty 
of  his  character  united  with  the  tenderness  of  his  sensibilities,  had  disqualified 
him  from  any  attempt  to  seek  further  than  for  the  simplest  words  in  which  to 
signify  his  acceptance.  The  secretary's  record  gives  us  the  following  language 
which,  in  subdued  and  tremulous  voice,  fell  from  Washington's  lips  : 

1  Mr.  President :  Though  I  am  truly  sensible  of  the  high  honor  done  me  in 
chis  appointment,  yet  I  feel  great  distress,  from  a  consciousness  that  my  abili- 
ties and  military  experience  may  not  be  equal  to  the  extensive  and  important 
trust.  However,  as  the  Congress  desire  it,  I  will  enter  upon  the  momentous 
duty,  and  exert  every  power  I  possess  in  their  service,  and  for  the  support  of 
the  glorious  cause.  I  beg  they  will  accept  my  most  cordial  thanks  for  this 
distinguished  testimony  of  their  approbation.  But  lest  some  unlucky  event 
should  happen,  unfavorable  to  my  reputation,  I  beg  it  may  be  remembered  by 

1  Wirt  tells  us  that  when  Patrick  Henry  returned  to  unquestionably  the  greatest  man  on  that  floor.'     Such 

his  home  after  the  first  session,  as  was  natural,  he  was  was  the  penetration,  which  at  that  early  period  of  Mr. 

surrounded  by  his  neighbors,  who  were  eager  to  hear  Washington's   life,  could   pierce   through   his  retiring 

what  had  been  done,  and  what  kind  of  men  had  com-  modesty  and  habitual  reserve,  and  estimate  so  correcdy 

posed  that  illustrious  body.     He  answered  their  inquir-  the  unrivalled  worth  of  his  character, 

ies  with  all  his  wonted  kindness  and  candor  ;  and  hav-  a  The  Congress  have  made  choice  of  the  modest 

mg  been  asked  by  one  of  them,  whom  he  thought  the  and  virtuous,  the  amiable,  generous  and  brave  George 

greatest  man  in  Congress,  he  replied  :    '  If  you  speak  Washington,   Esq.,    to  be   General   of  the   American 

of  eloquence,  Mr.  Rutledge,  of  South  Carolina,  is  by  armies.  .  .  .  This  appointment  will  have  a  great  effect 

fkr  the  greatest  orator  ;  but  if  you  speak  of  solid  infor-  in  cementing  and  securing  the  union  of  these  colonies, 

mation  and  sound  judgment,   Colonel  Washington  is  — John  Adams  to  his  wife,  June  17,  '75. 

17 


258  WASHINGTON  SETS  OUT  FOR  CAMBRIDGE. 

every  gentleman  in  this  room,  that  I,  this  day,  declare  with  the  utmost  sin- 
cerity, I  do  not  think  myself  equal  to  the  command  I  am  honored  with.  As 
to  pay,  sir,  I  beg  leave  to  assure  the  Congress  that,  as  no  pecuniary  consid- 
eration could  have  tempted  me  to  accept  the  arduous  employment,  at  the  ex- 
pense of  my  domestic  ease  and  happiness,  I  do  not  wish  to  make  any  profit 
from  it.  I  will  keep  an  exact  account  of  my  expenses.  Those,  I  doubt  not, 
they  will  discharge,  and  that  is  all  I  desire.' 

There  are  points  in  the  annals  of  nations,  when  a  writer  of  even  so  brief 
an  historic  sketch  as  this,  finds  himself  arrested  in  the  presence  of  events  so 
momentous  that  he  becomes  powerless  to  describe  the  emotions  which  would 
befit  the  occasion.  From  this  distance,  we  may  well  contemplate  the  appoint- 
ment of  Washington  to  lead  the  American  armies,  as  one  of  the  most  signal 
events — not  less  important  than  the  choice  of  the  great  Hebrew  leader,  who 
was  selected  in  higher  than  earthly  councils  to  lead  a  nation  of  almost  cor- 
responding numbers  out  of  their  house  of  bondage.  Nor  ever,  perhaps,  has 
a  chieftain  gone  to  a  field  of  conflict,  for  glory  or  disgrace,  more  completely 
clothed  with  the  impenetrable  armor  of  heaven,  or  over  whose  path  hung  a 
holier  cloud  of  human  benediction. 

On  the  reassembling  of  Congress-—the  ioth  of  the  preceding  month — 
they  had  unanimously  resolved  to  put  the  country  into  a  state  of  defence, 
beginning  by  adopting  the  troops  gathered  around  Boston,  and  voting  to  raise 
ten  companies  of  riflemen  in  Pennsylvania,  Maryland  and  Virginia,  which  gave 
origin  to  the  far-famed  Continental  army. 

Washington  sets  out  to  join  the  Army. — Without  the  loss  of  an  hour  he 
began  the  preparations  for  his  march.  On  the  21st,  six  days  after  his 
appointment,  at  a  farewell  supper  given  to  him  by  the  members  of  Congress, 
they  all  rose  as  they  drank  '  a  health  to  the  Commander-in-Chief  of  the 
American  Army,'  and  stood  listening  in  profound  silence  for  the  reply,  for  as 
one  of  them  well  said  :  '  the  sense  of  the  difficulties  that  lay  before  him  was 
so  deep  in  every  heart  that  every  cheer  was  suppressed,  and  it  seemed  more 
as  though  we  should  pray  than  applaud ! ' 

On  the  morning  of  the  2 2d  of  June,  Washington  was  escorted  out  of 
Philadelphia  by  an  imposing  civil  and  military  cavalcade.1  The  first  rumors 
of  the  skirmishes  of  Lexington,  Concord  and  Charlestown  had  reached 
Philadelphia  the  day  before.  On  the  eve  of  starting,  Washington  had  an- 
nounced to  his  wife,  whose  miniature  he  wore  on  his  breast  from  the  day 
of  his  marriage,  till  the  day  of  his  death,  « the  cutting  stroke  of  his  departure.' 
*  A  kind  of  destiny,'  he  said,  '  has  thrown  me  upon  this  service.'  At  the  same 
time,  he  wrote  to  his  brother,  '  I  bid  adieu  to  every  kind  of  domestic  ease, 
and  embark  on  a  wide  ocean,  boundless  in  its  prospect,  and  in  which  per- 
haps ro  safe  harbor  is  to  be  found.' 

1  In  a  letter  to  his  wife,  June  23d,  John  Adams    little  way  on  the  journey  to  the  American  Camp  before 
says  : — '  I  have  this  morning  been  out  of  town  to  accom-     Boston.' 
pany  our  generals  Washington,  Lee,  and  Schuyler,  a 


WASHINGTON'S  RECEPTION  IN  NEW  YORK.  259 

Washington's  Reception  at  New  York,  June  25. — Accompanied  by  Gen. 
erals  Lee  and  Schuyler,  under  the  escort  of  the  Philadelphia  Light  Horse, 
Washington  entered  Newark  on  Sunday,  the  25th.  The  news  that  the  com- 
mander-in-chief was  to  enter  New  York  that  afternoon,  transported  the 
town  with  the  wildest  excitement ;  the  bells  rang  merry  peals  of  welcome,  and 
at  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  Washington,  dressed  in  a  uniform  of  blue,  was 
received  at  Lispenard's  by  the  mass  of  the  inhabitants.  Drawn  in  an  open 
carriage  by  a  pair  of  white  horses,  he  was  escorted  into  the  town  by  nine 
companies  of  infantry,  while  multitudes,  of  all  ages  and  both  sexes,  bent  their 
eyes  on  him  from  the  housetops,  the  windows,  and  the  streets.  The  following 
day,  the  Provincial  Congress  of  New  York,  presented  to  him  an  address, 
expressing  their  confidence,  that  '  from  his  ability  and  virtue  they  were  expect- 
ing security  and  peace,'  but  declaring,  '  the  hope  of  an  accommodation  with 
the  mother  country,  to  be  the  dearest  wish  of  every  American  heart,  and  that 
he  would  then  resign  his  trust,  and  become  once  more  a  citizen.'  In  reply  to 
these  timid  words,  the  following  noble  sentiments,  in  behalf  of  himself  and  col- 
leagues were  firmly  uttered  :  '  When  we  assumed  the  soldier,  we  did  not  lay 
aside  the  citizen  ;  but  having  taken  the  sword,  we  postpone  the  thought  of 
private  life,  to  the  establishment  of  American  liberty  on  the  most  firm  and 
solid  foundation  ; '  and  in  this  spirit  he  continued  his  march.  The  arrival 
of  the  news  of  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill  made  him  more  anxious  to  press 
forward.1  The  road  from  New  York  to  Cambridge,  witnessed  one  continued 
ovation  :  everywhere  he  was  greeted  with  cheers  and  benedictions. 

He  reaches  the  Scene  of  War. — After  passing  Sunday,  the  2d  of  July,  1775, 
in  his  head-quarters  at  Cambridge,5  attended  by  his  staff  he  rode  out  to  the  Com- 
mon the  next  morning,  and  formally  took  command  of  the  Continental  army. 

Washington's  Major-Generals. — During  the  very  hours  in  which  the  battle 
of  Bunker  Hill  was  raging,  Congress  was  electing  its  four  Major-Generals.  The 
patriotism  of  the  people  of  Massachusetts,  the  wisdom  of  her  councils,  and  the 
prowess  of  her  soldiers,  had   commanded  the  warmest  sympathy  and  the 

1  In  his  address  in  1843,  Hon.  Daniel  Webster  *  As  the  day  was  fast  declining,  I  hastened  to 
states,  that  it  rested  on  undisputable  authority,  that,  sketch  the  headquarters  of  Washington,  an  elegant  and 
when  Washington  heard  of  the  battle  of  Bunker's  Hill,  spacious  edifice,  standing  in  the  midst  of  shrubbery 
and  was  told  that  for  want  of  ammunition  and  other  and  stately  elms,  a  little  distance  from  the  street,  once 
causes  the  militia  yielded  the  ground  to  the  British  the  highway  from  Harvard  University  to  Waltham. 
troops,  he  asked  if  the  militia  of  New  England  stood  At  this  mansion,  and  at  Winter  Hill,  Washington 
the  fire  of  the  British  regular  troops  ;  and  being  told  passed  most  of  his  time,  after  taking  command  of  the 
that  they  did,  and  reserved  their  own  until  the  enemy  Continental  army,  until  the  evacuation  of  Boston  in  the 
were  within  eight  rods,  and  then  discharged  it  with  following  Spring.  Its  present  owner  is  Henry  Wads- 
fearful  effect,  he  then  exclaimed  :  '  The  liberties  of  the  worth  Longfellow,  Professor  of  Modern  Languages 
country  are  safe  ! '  Washington  on  the  10th  of  Febru-  in  Harvard  University,  and  widely  known  in  the  world 
ary,  1776,  wrote  to  Joseph  Reed  :  'With  respect  to  of  literature  as  one  of  the  most  gifted  men  of  the  age. 
myself,  I  have  never  entertained  an  idea  of  an  accom-  .  .  .  This  mansion  stands  upon  the  upper  of  two  ter- 
modation,  since  I  heard  of  the  measures  which  were  races,  which  are  ascended  each  by  five  stone  steps 
adopted  in  consequence  of  the  Hunker's  Hill  fight.  The  At  each  front  corner  of  the  house  is  a  lofty  elm — mere 
king's  speech  has  confirmed  the  sentiments  I  entertain-  saplings  when  Washington  beheld  them,  but  now  state- 
ed  upon  the  news  of  that  affair,  and  if  every  man  was  ly  and  patriarchal  in  appearance.  Other  elms,  with 
of  my  mind,  the  ministers  of  Great  Britain  should  know,  flowers  and  shrubbery,  beautify  the  grounds  around  it, 
in  a  few  words,  upon  what  issue  the  cause  should  be  while  within,  iconoclastic  innovation  has  not  been  al- 
put.'  This  issue  was  a  determination  to  shake  off  all  lowed  to  enter  with  his  mallet  and  trowel  to  mar  the 
connection  with  Great  Britain.  '  This  I  would  tell  work  of  the  ancient  builder,  and  to  cover  with  the  vul- 
them,  not  under  cover,  but  in  words  as  clear  as  the  son  gar  stucco  of  modern  art  the  carved  cornices  and  pan- 
in  its  meridian  brightness.' — Frothingham's  History  eled  wainscots  that  first  enriched  it. — Lossing's  Fielu 
qf  the  Siege  0/  Boston,  pp.  157-158.  Book  of  the  Revolution,  pp.  555-556. 


260  THE  FOUR  MAJOR-GENERALS  APPOINTED, 

deepest  respect  of  the  whole  country,1  and  by  common  consent.  Artemas 
Ward,  one  of  her  favorite  soldiers,  was  placed  at  the  head  of  the  list.  The 
second  choice,  which  fell  upon  Charles  Lee,  was  not  so  fortunate.  He  was 
the  son  of  an  English  officer,  and  had  been  brought  up  for  the  army.  He  had 
seen  some  service  under  the  crown  in  Turkey,  Poland,  and  Portugal,  as  well 
as  in  America,  but  had  left  the  army  of  the  king,  to  seek  advancement  as  an 
adventurer,  wherever  fortune  might  tempt  him.  Putting  forth  high  pretensions 
for  military  ability,  and  pressed  by  his  friends,  he  found  his  way  into  the 
Colonial  army,  where  his  brilliant,  but  superficial  qualities  gave  him  an  easy 
passport  to  transient  popularity.  He  received  the  appointment,  but  he  had 
no  love  for  liberty  nor  the  cause  of  independence.  All  his  sympathies  were 
with  the  crown,  and  his  cravings  were  for  the  society  of  British  officers.  It 
was  fortunate  that  this  element  gained  no  greater  prominence  than  it  did  in 
the  American  army,  or  the  public  councils.  General  Lee  was  to  make  trouble 
enough  for  the  commander-in-chief. 

New  York  was  expected  to  name  the  third  officer,  and  owing  more  to  his 
social  rank,  benevolence  of  manner,  unsullied  integrity,  and  earnest  patriot- 
ism, than  to  military  reputation,  he  was  preferred  to  Richard  Montgomery, 
who  with  the  energy  and  ambition  of  youth,  and  with  higher  military  genius, 
should  have  received  the  appointment.2  Schuyler  would  have  adorned  any 
civil  office,  but  with  his  best  efforts  he  could  nev*er  shine  as  a  soldier — least 
of  all  where  vigorous  health,  steadiness  of  self-control,  keenness  of  penetra- 
tion, and  quickness  of  movement  were  imperatively  demanded  in  the  soldier 
of  that  period. 

Connecticut  had  three  men  from  whom  it  was  difficult  to  choose.  Spencer 
and  Wooster  were  his  superiors  in  rank  and  age,  and  had  already  displayed 
some  of  the  high  qualities  demanded  in  active  warfare ;  but  Israel  Putnam's 
feats  of  daring  in  the  French  war,  his  service  in  the  British  ?^my  at  the  cap- 
ture of  Havana,  with  the  prestige  he  had  just  gained  at  Bunker  Hill,  and  in 
a  brilliant  skirmish  which  succeeded  it,  had  left  all  other  rivals  behind  him, 
and  he  received  the  commission,  although  he  had  been  long  in  the  retirement 
of  his  farm,  and  had  already  reached  the  age  of  fifty-seven. 

Horatio  Gates  was  chosen  Adjutant-General,  with  the  rank  of  Brigadier.2 
Bancroft  is  probably,  on  the  whole,  just  in  the  estimate  he  makes  of  his  char- 

1  On  Sept.  18,  John  Adams  wrote  to  his  wife  :  General  Montgomery's  Answer  to  James 
'The  esteem,  the  affection,  the  admiration  for  the  peo-  Duane  :  ' Dear  Sir— I  have  been  honored  with  your 
pie  of  Boston  and  the  Massachusetts,  which  were  ex-  letter  of  the  21st  instant.  My  acknowledgments  are  due 
pressed   yesterday,   and  the  fixed  determination  that  for  the  attention  shown  me  by  the  Congress. 

they  should  be  supported,  were  enough  to  melt  a  heart  '  I  submit  with  great  cheerfulness  to  any  regulation 

of  stone.     I  saw   the  tears  gush  into  the  eyes  of  old,  they  in  their  prudence  shall  judge  expedient.      Laying 

grave,  pacific  Quakers  of  Philadelphia.'  aside  the  punctilio  of  the  soldier,  I  shall  endeavor  tc 

2  The  advancement  of  a  junior  officer  over  his  head  discharge  my  duty  to  society,  considering  myself  as  the 
might  very  naturally  have  been  expected  to  prove  of-  citizen,  reduced  to  the  melancholy  necessity  of  taking 
fensive  to  a  man  like  Montgomery,  not  himself  a  na-  up  arms  for  the  public  safety. 

tive  American,  and  who,  having  been  educated  in  the  ■  I  am,  etc' 

European  schools  of  military  service  would  of  course  North  American  Review,  July,  1839,  p.  170. 

have  been  supposed  to  entertain  their  rigid  notions  of  2  Seth  Pomeroy,  Richard  Montgomery,   David 

military  honor.    The  Congress,  conscious  of  the  offence  Wooster,  Joseph  Spencer,  William  Heath,  John 

they  might  be  likely   to    give   by  their   proceedings,  Thomas,   John    Sullivan,  and  Nathaniel   Green 

directed  James  Duane,  a  member  of  that  body  repre-  were  appointed  Brigadier-  Generals,   all  of  them,  ex 

senting  New  York,  to  write  to  that  officer,  and   to  ex-  cept  Montgomery,  New  England  men. 
plain  away  the  matter  as  well  as  he  could. 


JEALOUSY  OF  MILITARY  POWER.  261 

acter :  '  He  was  shallow,  vain,  and  timorous,  and  of  little  administrative  ability. 
His  ease  of  manner,  and  comparatively  large  experience,  enabled  him  to 
render  service  in  bringing  the  incoherent  regiments  of  novices  into  order ; 
but  from  the  first  he  was  restless  for  high  promotion,  without  possessing  any 
one  of  the  qualities  requisite  in  a  military  leader.  The  continent  took  up 
arms  with  only  one  general  officer  who  drew  to  himself  the  trust  and  love  of 
the  country,  with  not  one  of  the  five  next  below  him  fit  to  give  him  efficient 
aid,  or  to  succeed  to  his  place.' 

Had  the  Fathers  of  the  Republic,  sitting  in  Congress,  then  comprehended 
the  military  and  intellectual  character  of  Washington,  as  they  afterwards  did, 
there  would  have  been  less  desire  to  circumscribe  his  authority  as  command- 
er-in-chief. One  of  the  most  serious  embarrassments  under  which  he  labored, 
especially  in  the  early  part  of  the  Revolution,  had  its  origin  chiefly  in  this 
cause  ;  but  the  reasons  for  it  were  sufficiently  obvious.  Civilians  seldom 
know  how  much  better  than  any  other  man,  is  a  commander  in  the  field  quali- 
fied to  choose  his  own  subordinates.  Our  statesmen  had,  moreover,  strong 
and  well-founded  jealousies  of  the  dangers  of  the  encroachment  of  the  military 
over  the  civil  authorities,  since  the  experience  of  other  nations  showed  how 
often  liberty  had  fallen  by  the  sword  which  achieved  it ;  and  besides,  Wash- 
ington, himself,  partly  from  the  native  modesty  of  his  character,  but  chiefly 
from  the  sharp  line  he  always  drew  between  the  province  of  the  soldier  and 
the  legislator,  held  strictly  to  the  absolute  subordination  of  the  sword  to  the 
state.  These  points  should  be  kept  steadily  in  mind,  or  it  will  be  very  diffi- 
cult for  a  reader  not  profoundly  versed  in  American  history,  to  understand  the 
complicated  difficulties  under  which  Washington  had  to  conduct  the  army  to 
ultimate  victory.  In  no  other  way  can  he  account  for  the  delays,  the  inef- 
ficiency, the  unfortunate,  and  sometimes  almost  fatal,  conflicts  of  authority 
that  were  continually  arising  during  the  struggle.  In  fact,  the  greatest  of  all 
political  problems  ever  presented  for  the  solution  of  the  statesman,  or  his- 
torian, in  this  or  any  other  nation,  has  been,  and  will  long  continue  to  be, 
how  so  great  and  protracted  a  war  could  have  been  successfully  waged,  and 
how  a  government  so  strong,  and  yet  so  free,  could  have  been  constructed  of 
such  heterogeneous  and  perpetually  conflicting  elements.  Familiar  with  fire- 
arms from  boyhood,  as  the  great  body  of  the  American  people  were,  and  in- 
flamed as  they  were  with  so  martial  a  spirit,  yet  the  very  excess  of  their 
freedom;  the  jealousies  with  which  each  colony  guarded  its  sovereignty  ;  the 
absence  of  all  elements  of  cohesion  except  the  common  desire,  and  the 
common  purpose  to  achieve  independence  ;  their  universal  intelligence  ;  the 
habits  of  independence  with  which  they  had  grown  up — each  man  relying  upon 
his  own  judgment,  and  depending  upon  his  own  resources — all  these  con- 
siderations seemed  to  preclude  the  idea  of  centralization  : — and,  as  we  shall 
find,  seven  long  years  had  to  go  by,  after  independence  was  achieved,  before 
order,  consolidation  and  system  could  crystallize  into  a  symmetrical  govern- 
ment.    No  wonder  that  the  most  intelligent  friends  of  liberty  in  Europe, 


262  A  PEOPLE  IN  ARMS— NOT  AN  ARMY. 

during  this  whole  period  of  conflict,  contemplated  the  issue  with  doubt,  and 
greeted  the  final  result  with  the  gladness  which  always  attends  an  unexpected 
triumph. 

From  this  standpoint,  let  the  reader  contemplate  the  Commander-in- 
Chief,  on  Monday  morning,  the  third  day  of  July,  1775,  as  he  rode  from  his 
headquarters  at  Cambridge,  attended  by  his  staff,  to  a  grand  old  elm-tree 
that  towered  above  the  Common,  to  assume  command  of  the  Continental 
army.  He  found  it  composed  of  upwards  of  seventeen  thousand  men ;  their 
lines  dispersed  in  a  semi-circle  from  the  west  of  Dorchester  to  Maiden,  a 
distance  of  nine  miles.  But  it  was  all  a  scene  of  bewildering  confusion. 
From  every  part  of  Massachusetts,  and  the  nearest  colonies,  had  come  rush- 
ing enthusiastic  multitudes,  to  make  up  a  suddenly  improvised,  and  half- 
equipped  army,  to  resist  the  first  onset  of  a  disciplined  force,  which  had  not 
only  been  trained  on  the  distant  fields  of  Europe  by  the  best  Generals  of 
the  age,  but  were  furnished  with  the  completest  equipment,  and  the  most 
abundant  munitions,  which  the  art  of  war  could  provide.  But  these  raw 
volunteers  had  stood  their  ground  with  the  steadiness  of  veterans,  twice 
repelling  as  well-conducted,  and  gallant  assaults  as  are  ever  made  on  battle- 
fields. There  was  indeed  no  lack  of  valor,  nor  was  there  to  be  for  some 
time  any  lack  of  men  in  the  patriot  lines  ;  and  there  was  absolute  devotion 
to  country  and  to  God.  But  when,  after  riding  along  all  the  lines,  he 
returned  to  his  headquarters  at  evening,  and  looked  off  on  the  surrounding 
hills,  from  which  a  new-born  flag,1 — which  was  afterwards  to  give  place  to  the 
national  standard, — was  floating,  and  heard  the  shouts  of  welcome  which 
rolled  over  those  tiny  plains  and  valleys,  the  Commander  looked  with  the 
eyes  of  a  soldier,  in  spite  of  the  exultation  which  swelled  the  heart  of  the 
patriot.  He  saw  only  the  rough  material  from  which  discipline,  trial,  and 
time  alone  could  create  an  army.3  At  the  outset,  therefore,  he  encountered 
an  obstacle  which  military  leaders  have  always  regarded  as  the  most  formi- 
dable ;  for  ardent  as  these  'Sons  of  Liberty'  were,  and  complete  as  was 
their  consecration  to  the  national  cause,  and  comprehending  even  some- 
what of  the  greatness  of  their  undertaking,  and  unappalled  as  they  were  at 
the  dark  cloud  that  shut  down  on  the  future,  the  great  mass  had  no  manner 

1  That  flag  was  composed  of  thirteen  stripes,  alter-  as  various  as  the  tastes  of  their  occupants.  Some 
nate  red  and  white,  symbolizing  the  Thirteen  revolted  were  of  boards,  some  of  sailcloth,  or  partly  of  both  ; 
Colonies.  In  one  corner  was  the  device  of  the  British  others  were  constructed  of  stone  and  turf,  or  of  birch 
Union  Flag,  namely,  the  Cross  of  St.  George,  com-  and  other  brush.  Some  were  thrown  up  in  a  careless 
posed  of  a  horizontal  and  perpendicular  bar,  and  the  hurry  ;  others  were  curiously  wrought  with  doors  and 
cross  of  St.  Andrew,  representing  Scotland,  which  is  windows,  woven  out  of  withes  and  reeds.  The  moth- 
in  the  form  of  an  X.  .  .  .  On  the  14th  of  June,  ers,  wives,  or  sisters  of  the  soldiers  were  constantly 
I777»  Congress  ordered  'thirteen  stars,  white,  in  a  coming  to  the  camp,  with  supplies  of  clothing  and 
blue  field,'  to  be  put  in  the  place  of  the  British  household  gifts.  Boys  and  girls,  teo,  flocked  in  with 
union  device.  Such  is  the  design  of  our  Flag  at  the  their  parents  from  the  country,  to  visit  their  kindred, 
present  day.  A  star  has  been  added  for  every  new  and  gaze  on  the  terrors  and  mysteries  of  war.  Elo- 
State  admitted  into  the  Union,  while  the  original  quent  and  accomplished  chaplains  kept  alive  the  habit 
number  of  stripes  is  retained. — Lossing's  Hist.  U.  S.,  of  daily  prayer,  and  preached  the  wonted  sermons  on 
p.  245.  the  day  of  the  Lord.     The  habit  of  inquisitiveness  and 

2  The  community  in  arms  presented  a  motley  spec-  self-direction  stood  in  the  way  of  military  discipline ; 
tacle.  In  d;ess  there  was  no  uniformity.  The  com-  the  men  had  never  learnt  implicit  obedience,  and  knew 
panies  from  Rhode  Island  were  furnished  with  tents,  not  how  to  set  about  it  :  between  the  privates  and  their 
and  had  the  appearance  of  regular  troops  ;  others  filled  officers  there  prevailed  the  kindly  spirit  and  equality 
the  College  halls,  the  Episcopal  church,  and  private  of  life  at  home. — Bancroft,  voL  viii.  p.  44. 

houses ;  the  fields  were  strewn  with  lodges,  which  were 


VIRGINIA  LEADS  THE  GRAND  INSURRECTION.  263 

of  conception  of  the  meaning  of  the  words,  subordination,  or  discipline.     It 
was  only  a  people  in  amis — an  army  was  yet  to  be  formed. 

The  Virginians  Leading  the  Gra?id  Ltisurrection  in  the  South. — Leaving 
Washington  to  organize  the  Army  for  Independence,  let  us  cast  a  glance  to 
cur  old  favorite  fields  beyond  the  Potomac. 

The  Virginians  had  come  bravely  up  to  meet  the  crisis,  and  the  results 
showed  that  they  were  prepared  to  repel  the  aggressions  of  England  in  the 
same  spirit  which  had  marked  the  movements  in  Massachusetts.  After  Lord 
Dunmore  had  seized  and  removed  the  military  stores  from  Williamsburg,  then 
the  capital  of  Virginia,  and  for  which  he  had  made  payment  to  Patrick  Henry 
on  his  demand  at  the  head  of  his  Culpeper  regiment,  he  was  driven  from  his 
palace,  and  compelled  to  take  refuge  on  board  a  British  man-of-war  in  the 
York  River.  He  proclaimed  martial  law  throughout  Virginia,  and  attempting 
to  excite  insurrection  among  the  slaves,  offered  rewards  of  liberty  and  money, 
for  all  fugitives  who  would  escape  to  his  protection.  Having  made  his  prepara- 
tions for  carrying  on  war  with  the  aid  of  British  vessels,  he  attacked  Hampton, 
near  Old  Point  Comfort,  on  the  second  of  October.  But  the  Virginians 
rallied,  and  in  a  severe  battle  on  the  9th  of  December,  at  Great  Bridge,  twelve 
miles  from  Norfolk,  they  repulsed  this  motley  army  of  British  soldiers, 
negroes,  refugees,  and  tories,  and  compelled  the  commander'  to  escape  to 
his  shipping  in  Norfolk  harbor.  Five  days  later,  the  Virginians  entered  Nor- 
folk in  triumph,  where  they  were  joined  by  Colonel  Robert  Howe,  who 
brought  with  him  a  regiment  from  North  Carolina.  Exasperated  by  his  de- 
feat, on  the  evening  of  New  Year's  day,  1776,  Dunmore  began  the  destruction 
of  Norfolk,  with  a  bombardment  from  sixty  pieces  of  cannon.  As  night  came 
on,  several  boats  were  sent  ashore  to  burn  the  warehouses  on  the  wharves 
and  spread  the  flames  along  the  river.  Attempts  were  made  to  land,  but 
they  were  unsuccessful.  The  town  being  built  chiefly  of  pine  wood,  and 
favored  by  a  high  wind,  the  conflagration  became  general.  Women  and 
children,  mothers  with  their  little  ones  in  their  arms,  fled,  as  best  they  could, 
through  the  burning  streets.  The  fiendish  work  of  destruction  was  kept  up, 
until  the  fate  of  the  town  was  sealed.  The  fire  raged  for  three  days,  till  most 
of  the  place  was  reduced  to  heaps  of  ashes.  *  In  this  manner  the  royal 
Governor  burned  and  laid  waste  the  best  town  in  the  oldest  and  most  loyal 
colony  of  England,  to  which  Elizabeth  had  given  a  name,  and  Raleigh  de- 
voted his  fortune,  and  Bacon  and  Herbert  foretokened  greatness  ;  the  colony 
where  the  people  of  themselves  had  established  the  Church  of  England,  and 
where  many  were  still  proud,  that  their  ancestors  in  the  day  of  the  British 
Commonwealth,  had  been  faithful  to  the  line  of  kings.'  * 

When  Washington  heard  of  the  fate  of  the  richest  town  in  his  native  State,, 
in  one  of  those  sublime  transports  of  indignation  and  grief  that  sometimes 
shook  his  majestic  frame,  he  exclaimed,  { This,  and  the  threatened  devasta. 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  viii.  page  231. 


264  FRANKLIN  APPOINTED  POSTMASTER-GENERAL. 

tion  of  other  places,  will  unite  the  whole  country  in  one  indissoluble  band 
against  the  nation  which  seems  lost  to  every  sense  of  virtue,  and  those  feel* 
ings  which  distinguish  a  civilized  people  from  the  most  barbarous  savages.' 
After  the  destruction  of  Norfolk,  a  storm  came  on  which  threatened  to  shatter 
the  titled  incendiary's  ships,  and  with  such  of  the  inhabitants  as  chose  his  pro- 
tection, and  about  one  thousand  fugitive  negroes  all  huddled  together  on  board, 
destitute  of  every  comfort,  the  humiliated  Governor  put  to  sea.  Unable  to 
carry  on  the  war,  except  as  a  marauder,  he  committed  depredations  along  the 
defenceless  coast  of  Virginia,  making  his  headquarters  at  Gwyn's  Island,  in 
Chesapeake  Bay,  until  he  was  driven  away  by  a  brigade  of  Virginia  troops 
under  General  Lewis.  The  blackness  of  his  villany  finally  culminated  as  he 
reached  the  West  Indies,  where  he  sold  the  thousand  negroes  he  had  seduced 
from  their  homes,  into  the  deep  hopelessness  of  tropical  slavery.1 

Benjamin  Franklin  Appointed  Postmaster-General. — Let  us  look  for  a 
moment  at  the  proceedings  of  the  Congress. 

A  system  of  communication  had  to  be  established  for  conveying  intelli- 
gence throughout  the  Colonies.  There  was  but  one  man  thought  of  for  that 
business.  By  unanimous  vote  Benjamin  Franklin  was  chosen  Postmaster- 
General,  with  power  to  appoint  deputies  for  carrying  mails  between  Maine  and 
Georgia.  The  service  thus  rendered  can  hardly  be  understood  in  our  time. 
Nor  is  it  quite  enough  to  say  that  Franklin  had  more  to  do  with  the  actual 
business  arrangements  of  the  American  Revolution  at  home  and  abroad, 
than  any  other  man,  Washington  alone  excepted,  and  he  only  in  the  qua- 
lity of  commander-in-chief.  While  the  public  attention  of  a  nation  or  com- 
munity is  absorbed  in  startling  events,  its  business  machinery  ought  to  move 
steadily  and  securely  on.  During  the  long  struggle,  the  brain  of  Franklin 
was  ceaselessly  at  work  on  the  practical  business  of  the  country.  He  over- 
looked nothing — he  foresaw  everything — he  provided  for  the  most  unex- 
pected exigencies — he  devised  means  that  nobody  else  had  thought  of — he 
multiplied  resources  where  they  existed — he  created  them  where  there  were 
none — he  was  led  astray  by  no  chimera — no  sophistry  or  fallacy  eluded  the 
keen  perception  and  grasp  of  his  mind — in  a  word,  he  was  the  political 
philosopher  of  his  age  ;  doing  for  a  whole  people  in  almost  every  depart- 
ment of  public  and  private  life,  what  Bacon  did  for  philosophy  in  his  system 
of  induction ;  what  Shakspeare  did  to  teach  men  a  knowledge  of  human 
nature ;  and  what  Galileo  did  to  bring  the  heavens  down  to  the  earth. 
Franklin  made  a  school-house  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies,  in  which  he  educated 
by  his  precepts,  his  example,  his  newspapers,  his  almanacs,  his  letters,  and 
his  deeds,  the  great  mass  of  the  American  people  in  the  practical  concerns  of 

1  But  in  truth  the  cry  of  Dunmore  did  not  rouse  have  been  accomplished  ha*l  he  been  master  of  the 
among  the  Africans  a  passion  for  freedom.  To  them  country,  and  used  an  undisputed  possession  to  em- 
bondage  in  Virginia  was  not  a  lower  condition  of  being,  body  and  train  the  negroes,  cannot  be  told  ;  but  as  it 
than  their  former  one  ;  they  had  no  regrets  for  ancient  was,  though  he  boasted  that  they  flocked  to  his  stand- 
privileges  lost ;  their  memories  prompted  no  demand  ard,  none  combined  to  join  him  from  a  longing  for  an 
for  political  changes  ;  no  struggling  aspiration  of  their  improved  condition  or  even  from  ill-will  to  their  masters.' 
own  had  invited  Dunmore' s  interposition  ;  no  memorial  — Bancroft,  vol.  viii.  p.  225. 
of  their  grievances  had  preceded  his  ^ffer.     What  might 


THE  OLIVE  BRANCH  REJECTED  BY  THE  KING.  265 

every-day  life.     In  these  respects  he  has  by  general  consent  been  regarded 
as  immeasurably  great. 

The  Royalists  and  Tories  of  the  Revolution. — There  were  many  right- 
minded  and  good  men  in  the  Colonies,  who,  up  to  the  last  moment,  had 
deemed  it  possible  to  bring  about  a  reconciliation  with  the  Crown,  and  they 
were  exhausting  every  means  in  their  power  to  give  realization  to  their 
hopes.  There  was  as  yet  no  unanimity  on  this  subject,  even  in  the  Con- 
tinental Congress.  An  absolute  and  final  rupture  with  Great  Britain  was  not 
readily  entertained  even  by  the  most  patriotic — Samuel  Adams  standing 
earliest  and  alone  in  his  ultraism.  But  things  had  gone  so  far  at  last,  that 
those  who  hung  back  from  taking  the  irrevocable  '  leap  in  the  dark  '  began 
to  be  regarded  with  coldness  if  not  suspicion.  Among  those  who  dis- 
tinguished themselves  in  the  final  futile  effort  to  press  the  'Olive  Branch' 
upon  the  obstinate  King  of  England,  was  Thomas,  a  descendant  of  William 
Penn,  and  one  of  the  former  Governors  of  the  Colony  of  Pennsylvania. 
Confiding  in  the  integrity  of  his  character,  he  was  made  the  bearer  of  a 
Petition  to  the  king,  drawn  up  by  the  Congress  in  most  respectful  terms,  and 
which  the  monarch  himself  declared  to  be  the  least  objectionable  of  all 
papers  of  that  stamp  ever  sent  to  him.  But  the  obstinate  ruler  returned 
insult  for  supplication,  and  in  his  speech  to  Parliament  charged  the  peti- 
tioners with  being  '  rebels,'  declaring  that  '  they  had  taken  arms  into  their 
hands  to  establish  an  independent  state.'  Few  kings  have  come  nearer  to 
uttering  a  great  truth  ;  and  yet  he  had  himself  to  blame  for  turning  his  accu- 
sation into  fact.  Anything  like  respect  or  kindness  in  the  king's  answer, 
would,  for  a  time  at  least,  have  paralyzed  the  Revolution.  But  whatever 
loyalty  there  was  left  in  the  great  heart  of  America,  was  pretty  nearly  extin- 
guished by  the  sternness  with  which  he  recommended  that  an  unrelenting 
policy  should  be  adopted  to  reduce  the  Colonies  to  submission. 

The  Olive  Branch  Rejected  by  the  King. — That  famous  Petition  was  called 
the  '  Olive  Branch.'  The  Colonists  understood  it  at  the  same  time  to  be  their 
ultimatum  ;  hence  its  rejection,  which  severed  them  from  the  throne,  became 
the  sole  act  of  the  king.  At  his  bidding,  Parliament  soon  afterward  prohi- 
bited trade  and  commerce  with  the  Colonies  ;  closed  all  their  ports ;  au- 
thorized the  seizure  and  destruction  of  all  American  ships  and  cargoes,  and 
the  capture  of  all  their  crews,  with  the  savage  provision  that  they  were  to  be 
treated  neither  as  subjects,  nor  prisoners,  but  as  slaves.  Prison  ships,  irons, 
and — that  last  infamy  which  insult  could  add  to  captivity,  the  lash — were 
decreed  to  be  the  fate  of  all  Americans  who  refused  to  submit  to  the  edicts 
of  the  throne. 

Foreign  Mercenaries  to  be  Employed. — The  'Olive  Branch' being  thus 
disdainfully  and  insultingly  rejected,  and  three  millions  of  people  proclaimed 
outlaws,   che  largest   possible    levy  was  made  upon  home  subjects,   to    be 


266  FOREIGN  MERCENARIES  EMPLOYED. 

sent  to  slaughter  their  brethren  in  America ;  and  no  other  terms  were  offered 
than  the  choice  between  slavery  or  death  on  the  one  side,  or  base  life  with 
hopeless  degradation,  on  the  other.  But  resolved,  at  all  hazards,  either  to  tyr- 
annize over,  or  annihilate  the  Thirteen  young  nations  springing  into  existence 
in  the  New  World,  the  author  of  this  infamous  policy  boldly  threw  off  the 
mask  of  whatever  there  was  of  decency  in  appearances,  or  of  humanity  in 
the  age,  and  resorted  to  an  act  which  covered  the  name  of  George  III.  and 
his  truculent  ministers  with  lasting  disgrace.  The  assassin  work  which  the 
king  found  neither  disposition  nor  men  enough  in  the  British  Islands  to  per- 
form, was  to  be  done  by  the  hands  of  foreign  mercenary  slaves  of  petty 
German  princes,  who  through  kinship  of  blood,  or  marriage,  or  the  corrupt- 
ing power  of  gold,  were  to  furnish  a  certain  number  of  men  at  so  much  per 
head,  to  come  to  America  for  the  avowed  purpose  of  killing  men,  women, 
and  children  enough,  burning  houses  and  desolating  towns,  and  spilling  blood 
enough,  to  establish  a  principle  which  was  at  war  with  the  British  Constitu- 
tion, and  for  which,  after  America  had  triumphed,  no  British  statesman  was 
ever  after  found  base  enough  to  advocate.  The  trenchant  pen  of  Thomas 
Carlyle  has  put  this  business  in  its  proper  light.     He  says : 

"What,  speaking  in  quite  unofficial  language,  is  the  net-purport  and  upshot 
of  war  ?  To  my  own  knowledge,  for  example,  there  dwell  and  toil,  in  the 
British  village  of  Dumdrudge,  usually  some  five  hundred  souls.  From  these, 
by  certain  *  Natural  Enemies '  of  the  French,  there  are  successively  selected, 
during  the  French  war,  say  thirty  able-bodied  men.  Dumdrudge,  at  her  own 
expense,  has  suckled  and  nursed  them  ;  she  has,  not  without  difficulty  and 
sorrow,  fed  them  up  to  manhood,  and  even  trained  them  to  crafts,  so  that  one 
can  weave,  another  build,  another  hammer,  and  the  weakest  can  stand  under 
thirty  stone  avoirdupois.  Nevertheless,  amid  much  weeping  and  swearing, 
they  are  selected ;  all  dressed  in  red ;  and  shipped  away,  at  the  public 
charges,  some  two  thousand  miles,  or  say  only  to  the  south  of  Spain  ;  and  fed 
there  till  wanted.  And  now  to  that  same  spot,  in  the  south  of  Spain,  are 
thirty  similar  French  artisans,  from  a  French  Dumdrudge,  in  like  manner 
wending,  till  at  length,  after  infinite  effort,  the  two  parties  come  into  actual 
juxtaposition,  and  thirty  stand  fronting  thirty,  each  with  a  gun  in  his  hand. 
Straightway  the  word  *  Fire '  is  given,  and  they  blow  the  souls  out  of  one  an- 
other ;  and  in  place  of  sixty  brisk,  useful  craftsmen,  the  world  has  sixty  dead 
carcases,  which  it  must  bury,  and  anew  shed  tears  for.  Had  these  men  any 
quarrel  ?  Busy  as  the  Devil  is,  not  the  smallest !  They  lived  far  enough 
apart ;  were  the  entirest  strangers ;  nay,  in  so  wide  a  Universe,  there  was 
even,  unconsciously,  by  Commerce,  some  mutual  helpfulness  between  them. 
How  then  ?  Simpleton  !  their  Governors  had  fallen-out ;  and,  instead  of 
shooting  one  another,  had  the  cunning  to  make  these  poor  blockheads  shoot. 
Alas  !  so  is  it  in  Deutschland,  and  hitherto  in  all  other  lands ;  still  as  of  old, 
4  what  devilry  soever  kings  do,  the  Greeks  must  pay  the  piper  ! '  In  that  fic- 
tion of  the  English  Smollet,  it  is  true,  the  final  Cessation  of  War  is  perhaps 


HELP  ASKED  FROM  CATHARINE  OF  RUSSIA.  267 

prophetically  shadowed  forth;  where  the  two  Natural  Enemies,  in  person, 
take  each  a  tobacco-pipe,  filled  with  brimstone,  light  the  same,  and  smoke 
in  one  another's  faces,  till  the  weaker  gives  in ;  but  from  such  predicted 
Peace-Era,  what  blood-filled  trenches,  and  contentious  centuries,  may  still 
divide  us  ! "  * 

The  king's  agents  did  not  hesitate  to  buy  up  troops  in  any  European 
market  wherever  they  were  exposed  for  sale,  or  their  masters  could  be  in- 
duced to  furnish  them.  The  king  found  his  instruments  among  his  own 
German  cousins,  especially  the  hereditary  princes  of  Hesse  Cassel,  Wiir- 
temberg,  Saxe  Gotha,  Darmstadt,  and  Baden.  He  even  attempted  to  recruit 
in  Holland,  and  the  House  of  Orange  might  have  been  seduced.  But  the 
principles  and  traditions  of  that  old  Republic  were  against  it,  and  it  was  in  con- 
flict with  the  laws  of  the  German  Empire.  From  that  time  the  neutrality  of 
Holland  was  proclaimed,  to  the  mortal  offence  of  England. 

The  King  asks  Help  from  Catherine  of  Russia. — All  the  finesse  of  di- 
plomacy was  also  resorted  to,  to  obtain  help  from  Catherine  of  Russia ;  and 
by  means  of  corrupting  ministers,  negotiations  had  gone  so  far,  that  the 
British  Cabinet  informed  their  generals  in  America,  that  very  shortly  twenty 
thousand  disciplined  Russian  troops  would  be  landed  in  Canada,  for  '  stamp- 
ing out  the  rebellion.'  George  wrote  a  long  and  affectionate  letter  to  his 
Imperial  cousin,  the  Empress,  imploring  her  to  assist  him  in  putting  an  end 
to  the  American  insurrection.  The  royal  autograph  was  put  into  her  hands 
at  Moscow.  Her  reply  showed  a  genius  for  statesmanship,  and  a  policy  that 
might  be  deemed  prophetic,  as  compared  with  the  stolid  and  blind  obstinacy 
of  the  British  king.  •  Cannot  your  Majesty  find  troops  enough  among  his 
German  friends  ?  I  have  the  extremest  reluctance  to  send  my  subjects  to 
fight  against  strangers  on  a  distant  continent.  I  have  been  embroiled  in  diffi- 
culties enough,  and  blood  enough  has  been  shed.  I  wish  repose  for  myself, 
and  my  empire.'  After  consulting  with  Ivan  Ctzernichew,  who  had  been  her 
ambassador  to  England,  but  who  was  now  her  Minister  of  Marine,  he  an- 
nounced his  opinion,  that  '  it  would  offend  the  great  body  of  the  people  of 
England,  who  were  utterly  opposed  to  the  policy  of  the  king  in  further  op- 
pressing his  American  colonies.'  Bancroft  well  asks,  '  What  motive  had  the 
people  of  Russia  to  interfere  against  the  armed  husbandmen  of  New  Eng- 
land ?  Why  should  the  oldest  monarchy  of  modern  Europe, — the  connecting 
link  between  the  world  of  antiquity,  and  the  modern  world, — assist  to  repress 
the  development  of  the  youngest  power  in  the  West  ?  Catherine  claimed  to 
sit  on  the  throne  of  the  Byzantine  Caesars,  as  heir  to  their  dignity  and  their 
religion ;  and  how  could  she  so  far  disregard  her  own  glory,  as  to  take  part 
in  the  American  dispute,  by  making  a  shambles  of  the  mighty  empire  which 
assumed  to  be  the  successor  of  Constantine's  ?  The  requisition  of  England 
was  marked  by  so  much  extravagance,  that  nothing  but  the  wildest  cre- 
dulity of  statesmanship  could  have  anticipated  success.' 

1  Sartor  Resartus,  pp.  120-1*1. 


268  RUSSIA  OUR  NATURAL  ALLY. 

Russia  and  the  United  States  Natural  Allies. — During  the  last  hundred 
years,  efforts  have  often  been  made  by  European  States  to  divert  the  sym- 
pathies of  Russia  from  the  American  Republic.  England  has  herself  tried 
it  more  than  once ;  but  every  attempt  has  ended  in  something  worse  than 
failure.  By  these  means,  the  governing  classes  in  Russia  have  been  in- 
duced to  pay  more  attention  to  this  country,  and  just  in  proportion  as  we 
became  the  object  of  their  study,  have  we  won  their  sympathy,  and  respect. 

The  policy  of  nations,  like  the  destiny  of  individuals,  is  oftener  determined 
by  intuitive  tendencies,  than  by  deliberate  purpose.  Strange  as  the  assertion 
may  seem,  it  is  nevertheless  true,  that  Russia  and  the  United  States  are  natu- 
ral allies. 

Peter  the  Great  and  George  Washington  were  born  brothers — they  were 
both  nation-builders.  They  began  crude,  but  with  vast  materials.  They 
were  inspired  by  a  common  sentiment  of  patriotism,  and  possessed  the  power 
to  wield  the  elements  of  widely  scattered  communities  into  the  firm  texture  of 
consolidated  government.  Without  supposing  that  the  gifted  Catherine 
should  have  been  a  prophet,  it  can  be  easily  understood  how  the  traditions  of 
her  ancestors  had  led  her  to  see  that  her  fortunes  might  be  materially  af- 
fected in  the  future  by  the  dismemberment  of  the  British  Empire,  which  was 
growing  up  to  be  her  most  formidable  competitor  for  the  control  of  Asia. 

This  sympathy  and  friendly  feeling  between  the  Russians  and  the  Ameri- 
cans, seems  to  be  a  riddle  to  English  statesmen  and  reviewers  ;  but  it  is  easily 
solved.  There  are  no  two  nations  in  the  world  which  so  closely  resemble  each 
other  in  many  respects,  as  these  two  countries.  Both  have  expanded  over  vast 
territories,  and  are  bounded  by  oceans.  They  are  separated  only  by  a  narrow 
and  shallow  strait  of  forty  miles,  soon  to  be  traversed  by  the  telegraph.  They 
have  the  only  two  continental  governments  in  the  world.  No  such  limits  can  be 
assigned  to  their  future  extension  as  define  the  bounds  of  other  nations.  We 
neither  desire  nor  contemplate  the  extension  of  our  political  sway  beyond  the 
continent  of  America.  This  naturally  belongs  to  us ;  and  if  there  be  no  attempt 
made  on  the  part  of  France,  or  England,  or  Spain,  to  disturb  the  progress  of 
the  American  political  system,  the  whole  thing  will  regulate  itself  without  vio- 
lence or  conflict.  Russia  has  extended  her  dominion  continuously  from  the  At- 
lantic to  the  Pacific :  so  have  we.  Another  cause  of  sympathy  between  the 
United  States  and  Russia  is  in  the  spirit  of  their  institutions,  which  are  made 
for  the  common  advancement  and  elevation  of  the  entire  people,  carried  out 
at  last  triumphantly  in  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  one  land,  and  serfdom 
in  the  other.  In  both  countries  'jubilant  bells  that  ring  the  knell  of  slavery 
forever'  have  sounded.  All  the  legislation  of  the  two  countries  is  democra- 
tic and  reformatory — none  of  it  retrograding — none  of  it  made  for  a  favored 
or  privileged  class  ;  but  all  for  the  elevation  of  the  masses.  In  one  sense, 
Russia  is  as  democratic,  and  more  so,  than  the  United  States  have  until  re- 
cently been.  Even  Finland,  among  the  most  northern  of  the  Russian  pro- 
vinces, has  a  local  parliament,  and  a  system  of  railways,  while  education  \% 
making  rapid   progress.     Russia  works  out   democratic   results   under   im 


EAUL  JONES. 


CONGRESS  BEGINS  TO  BUILD  A  NAVY.  269 

perial  forms  ;  we  under  republican.  The  spirit  of  the  Russian  system  is  not 
only  to  develop  its  own  resources  in  the  soil  and  mines,  the  forests  and  waters, 
but  in  the  capacity  of  her  own  people.  There  are  no  prejudices  there 
to  prevent  her  rewarding  and  elevating  talent,  either  among  her  own,  or 
foreign  people.  Wherever  genius  is  discovered,  the  government  invites  it  to 
service  and  activity.  This  is  the  case  somewhat  in  France,  but  never  in  Eng- 
land, where  'titled  shams  and  decorated  imbecilities'  are  the  order  of  the  day, 
and  the  spirit  of  the  government. 

Congress  Begins  to  Build  a  Navy. — It  was  resolved  to  begin  the  construc- 
tion of  war  vessels  for  the  defence  of  the  coast,  and  to  cripple  the  commerce 
of  the  enemy.  Washington  was  authorized  on  the  5th  of  October,  to  employ 
two  gunboats  to  cut  off  English  store-ships  bound  for  Quebec.  A  marine  com- 
mittee consisting  of  Dean,  Langdon,  and  Gadsden, — to  which  John  Adams  and 
other  names  were  subsequently  added, — recommended  a  series  of  efficient 
measures,  all'  of  which  were  adopted,  and  which  laid  the  foundation  of  a 
maritime  armament-  that  left  a  record  of  daring  and  successful  achieve- 
ments, which  in  their  soberest  narration,  blot  out  all  creations  of  romance 
on  the  ocean,  except  the  incomparable  sea  stories  of  our  own  sailor  Novelist. 
Four  '  national  cruisers  were  equipped  and  sent  to  sea  on  a  three  months' 
cruise,  but  without  any  provision  for  a  national  ensign,  and  probably  wear- 
ing the  colors  of  the  States  they  sailed  from.  Before  the  close  of  the  year, 
Congress  had  authorized  a  regular  navy  of  seventeen  vessels,  varying  in 
force  from  ten  to  thirty-two  guns  ;  established  a  general  prize  law  in  con- 
sequence of  the  burning  of  Falmouth  by  Mowatt ;  regulated  the  relative 
rank  of  military  and  naval  officers ;  established  the  pay  of  the  navy,  and 
appointed  Dec.  22,  1775,  Esek  Hopkins,  commander  and  chief  of  the  naval 
forces  of  the  embryo  Republic,  fixing  his  pay  at  .one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  dollars  a  month.  At  the  same  time,  captains  were  commissioned  to  the 
Alfred,  Columbus,  Andrea  Doria,  Cabot  and  Providence,  and  first,  second, 
and  third  lieutenants  were  appointed  to  each  of  those  vessels.1  .  .  .  Notwith- 
standing the  equipping  of  this  fleet,  the  necessity  of  a  common  national  flag 
seems  not  to  have  been  thought  of,  until  Doctor  Franklin,  Mr.  Lynch,  and 
Mr.  Harrison,  were  appointed  to  consider  the  subject,  and  assembled  at  the 
camp  at  Cambridge.  The  result  of  this  conference  was  the  retention  of  the 
king's  colors  or  union  jack,  representing  the  yet  recognized  sovereignty  of 
England,  but  coupled  to  thirteen  stripes  alternate  red  and  white,  emblematic 
of  the  union  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies  against  its  tyranny  and  oppression,  in 
^lace  of  the  hitherto  loyal  red  ensign.' 2 

'  1  John  Adams  gives  the  following  reasons  for  the  Preble  further  adds  :  Col.  Gadsden,  who  was  one  of 

choice  of  these  names  :  the  marine  committee,  presented  to  Congress  on  the  8th 

This  committee  soon  purchased  and  fitted  five  ves-  of  Feb.,  1776,   'an  elegant  standard,  such  as  is  to  be 

sels.     The  first  was  named   Alfred,   in   honor  of   the  used  by  the  commander-in-chief  of  the  American  navy  ; 

founder  of  the  greatest  navy  that  ever  existed.     The  being  a  yellow  flag  with  a  lively  representation  of  a 

second,  Columbus,  after  the  discoverer  of  this  quarter  of  rattlesnake  in   the  middle  in  the  attitude  of  going  to 

the  globe.     The  third,  Cabot,  for  the  discoverer  of  the  strike,  and  these  words  underneath,    'Don't  tread  on 

porthern  part  of  this  continent.    The  fourth,   Andrea  me.'     Congress  ordered  that  the  said  standard  be  care- 

Doria,  in  honor  of  the  great  Genoese  admiral ;  and  the  fully  preserved  and  suspended  in  the  Congress-room.' 
fifth,  Providence,  for  the  name  of  the  town  where  she 

was  purchased,  the  residence  of  Governor  Hopkins  and  2  Preble's   History  of  the   American 'Flag,    pp. 

bis  brother  Esek,  whom  we  app-inted  the  first  captain.  150-151. 


270  INVASION  OF  CANADA  DETERMINED  ON. 

The  Invasion  of  Canada  determined  on. — The  repeated  repulses  of  the 
British  army,  at  Bunker  Hill,  by  what  they  had  too  contemptuously  called  in 
the  beginning,  a  '  mob  of  traitors,'  changed  the  plan  of  the  enemy,  and,  for 
a  while,  paralyzed  their  movements.  Instead  of  crushing  an  insurrection,  they 
found  they  had  provoked  a  revolution,  and  a  day  of  humiliation  and  blood 
had  cost  them  the  prestige  of  invincibility.  Here  a  fact  of  great  importance 
was  first  revealed, — that,  while  at  no  time  could  delay  be  favorable  to  the 
royal  cause,  it  became  one  of  the  grandest  allies  of  the  patriots.  The  work 
of  maintaining  a  disputed  and  despised  sovereignty,  could  admit  of  no  post- 
ponement; while  the  certainty  of  the  ultimate  establishment  of  Republicanism 
waxed  stronger  by  every  day's  passage.  There  were  more  to-morrows  left 
for  the  Colonists,  than  for  the  king,  and  a  Fabius  was  at  the  head  of  the  pa- 
triot army. 

But  Washington  early  saw  when  to  strike,  and  the  sagacity  of  his  military 
judgment,  and  the  alacrity  of  his  unexpected  movements,  often  made  up 
for  leanness  of  provisions,  insufficiency  of  munitions,  and  scarcity  of  men. 
Knowing,  however,  that  inaction  had  always  proved  the  bane  of  armies,  he 
was  provoked  to  '  carry  the  war  into  Africa.' 

He  had  determined  to  capture,  or  drive  out  the  British  army  from  Boston, 
and  towards  this  object,  he  steadily  directed  all  his  efforts  during  the  summer 
and  autumn  of  1775.  The  capture  of  the  two  fortresses  on  Lake  Champ- 
lain — between  the  Lexington  skirmish  and  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill — had 
left  the  road  open  to  the  St.  Lawrence,  and  the  commander-in-chief  believed 
it  would  be  good  policy  to  make  a  bold  stroke  in  that  direction,  to  defeat  a 
union  of  the  British  forces  in  Canada  with  those  on  the  Atlantic  coast,  and 
prevent  that  province  from  becoming  a  rendezvous  for  supplying  the  enemy 
with  provisions  and  ammunition. 

Acting  in  harmony,  as  he  always  did  with  the  National  Congress)  at  his 
suggestion  a  committee  from  that  body,  consisting  of  Dr.  Franklin,  Thomas 
Lynch,  and  Benjamin  Harrison,  proceeded  in  August  from  Philadelphia  to 
Cambridge,  where  a  well-devised  plan  was  settled  on  for  the  invasion  of 
Canada,  which  was  carried  out  under  Schuyler  and  Montgomery  by  the  old 
route  of  Lakes  George  and  Champlain,  and  by  Arnold  up  the  Kennebeck 
and  Chaudiere. 

Allen  Captured  and  Sent  to  England  in  Heavy  Irons. — After  the  capture 
of  Ticonderoga  and  Crown  Point  in  the  previous  year,  Colonel  Ethan 
Allen  had  pressed  very  warmly  upon  Washington  the  plan  for  an  immediate 
invasion  of  Canada;  and  had  his  plan  been  adopted,  so  few  and  unpre- 
pared were  the  British  forces  in  that  province,  it  would  most  likely  have 
been  attended  with  complete  success.  St.  John,  on  the  Sorel,  was  the  first 
military  post  within  the  Canadian  line,  and  it  was  intended  that  Schuyler 
should  carry  the  place  ;  but  conceiving  the  obstacles  to  be  too  great,  he 
delayed  the  attack,  till  he  could  bring  on  more  troops  from  Ticonderoga, 
and   illness   compelled    him  to    return  to   Albany.       The  whole  command 


ARNOLD'S  MARCH  THROUGH  THE  WILDERNESS.  271 

devolving  upon  General  Montgomery,  he  early  left  his  island  intrench- 
meat,  and  in  September  laid  siege  to  St.  John.  The  siege  held  out  for 
more  than  a  month.  In  the  meantime  daring  enterprises  were  undertaker 
by  small  detachments ;  among  others  one  of  eighty  men,  under  Ethan  Allen, 
crossed  the  St.  Lawrence,  which,  being  unsuccessful,  he  was  made  prisoner, 
with  several  of  his  men,  and  sent  to  England  in  irons,1  but  Montgomery  cip- 
tured  Montreal,  and  entered  the  city  in  triumph,  November  13th.  Governoi 
Carlton  made  his  escape  with  his  forces  on  the  English  fleet,  and  took  refuge 
in  Quebec.  The  capture  of  Montreal  was  important  to  the  commander,  for 
among  other  spoils  he  found  winter  clothing  for  his  soldiers  during  the 
severity  of  the  winter ;  but  in  a  letter  to  Congress  he  said  that,  '  till  Quebec 
is  taken,  Canada  is  unconquered,'  and  he  pressed  on.  It  was  a  frightful  winter, 
and  many  of  his  troops  deserted.  Ice  had  bound  up  the  waters,  and  deep 
snow  covered  the  whole  region.  Nothing,  however,  discouraged  the  intrepid 
commander,  and  he  advanced  down  the  banks  of  the  river  where  he  was 
to  be  joined  by  Colonel  Benedict  Arnold. 

Arnold's  March  through  the  Wilderness. — -With  a  thousand  men  Arnold 
had  pressed  on  through  a  wilderness,  impenetrable  except  to  a  dauntless 
spirit  like  himself,  till,  after  one  of  the  most  wonderful  marches  recorded  in 
military  history,  he  stood  with  seven  hundred  and  fifty  worn  and  wasted,  but 
still  resolute  soldiers,  on  the  Plains  of  Abraham.  Not  the  countenance  of  a 
friend  or  foe  had  been  visible  in  that  gloomy,  and  dreadful  wilderness  march. 
Rivers  and  marshes  covered  with  ice,  had  to  be  traversed,  and  often  forded, 
with  the  whole  command  to  the  arm-pits  in  water  or  mud.a  Neither  hunger 
nor  cold  seemed  to  discourage  his  men,  so  magnetic  was  the  control  the 
leader  held  over  his  expedition.  On  the  ninth  of  November,  four  days  before 
Montgomery  had  entered  Montreal,  Arnold  reached  Point  Levi,  opposite 
the  city  of  Quebec,  with  his  half-naked  followers  armed  with  only  four  hundred 
muskets,  and  destitute  of  artillery.  He  crossed  the  St.  Lawrence  to  Wolfs 
Cove,  ascended  to  the  Plains  of  Abraham,  and  sent  a  bold  demand  for 
the  surrender  of  the  city  and  the  garrison.  '  Soon  the  icy  wind  and  intelligence 
of  an  intended  sortie  from  the  garrison,  drove  him  from  his  bleak  encampment, 

1  The  wounded,  seven  in  number,  entered  the  hos-  When  the  party  finally  reached  the  Chaudiere,  and  it 

pital  :  the  rest  were  shackled  together  in  pairs,  and  dis-  became  necessary  to  establish  a  communication   with 

tributed  among  different  transports  in  the  river.      But  General   Montgomery,  Burr  was  the  person  selected 

Allen,  as   the  chief  offender,  was  chained   with    leg  for  the  task ;  and  though  so  young,  he  acquitted  him- 

irons  weighing  about  thirty  pounds  ;  the  shackles  which  self  of  the  hazardous  duty  of  penetrating  a  country, — 

encompassed  his  ankles,  were  so  very  tight  and  close  the  inhabitants  of  which  adhered  to  the  British  power, 

that  he  could  not  lie  down  except  on  his  back  ;  and  in  and  spoke  a  different  language  from  his — with  prudence 

this  plight,  thrust  into  the  lowest  part  of  a  vessel,  the  and  perfect  success.     Upon  his  arrival  at  the  General's 

captor  of  Ticonderoga  was  dragged  to  England,  where  headquarters,  he  was  immediately  invited  to  assume  a 

imprisonment  in  Pendennis  Castle  could  not  abate  his  station  near  his  person,  in  anticipation  of  the  moment 

courage  or  his  hope. — Bancroft,  vol.  viii.  p.  184.  when  he  might  be  appointed  an  aide-de-camp.     Burr 

3  The  extraordinary  privations  suffered  by  the  de-  thus  became  an  actor  in  the  unsuccessful  assault  upon 

tachment  under  Arnold,  which   succeeded  in  making  Quebec  ;  was  present  when  Montgomery  fell,  and  was 

its  way  to  Quebec,  were  endured  by  no  one  of  its  mem-  the  person  who  bore  him  upon  his  shoulders  from  the 

bers  with  more  cheerfulness  and  patience  than  by  the  spot  when  retreat  became   necessary.      His   conduct 

stripling  who   had  volunteered  to  join  it.      And   this  throughout   this   trying   affair,  appears   to   have  been 

was  one  characteristic  which  was  remarked   in  Burr  marked  with  courage  and  with  judgment.      It  estab- 

through  life,  and  which  went  a  great  way  to  maintain  lished  for  him  a  high  reputation  at  the  time  among  the 

for  him  the  respect  of  those  immediately  around  him.  American  troops,  and  undoubtedly  deserved  free  and 

He  was  not  one  of  the  repining  kind,  who  wear  out  unqualified  praise. — North  American  Review,  July, 

the  patience  of  their  neighbors  with  their  catalogue  of  1839,  p.  165. 
complaints,  but  bore  all  his  misfortunes   like  a  man. 


272  DEA  TH  OF  MONTG  OMER  V. 

1 

and  he  ascended  the  St.  Lawrence  to  Point  aii  Trembles,  twenty  miles  above 
Quebec,  and  there  awaited  the  arrival  of  Montgomery.  These  brave  Generals 
met  on  the  first  of  December,  1775,  and  the  woollen  clothes  which  Mont 
gomery  had  brought  from  Montreal,  were  placed  on  the  shivering  limbs  of 
Arnold's  troops.     The  united  forces  then  marched  to  Quebec.' ■ 

Death  of  Montgomery,  Dec.  31,  1775. — Montgomery  was  no  stranger  in 
those  inhospitable  regions.  Sixteen  years  before,  hardly  yet  escaped  from  his 
boyhood,  he  had  passed  through  those  same  scenes  by  the  side  of  Wolfe, 
who  had  far  less  to  contend  with  than  Montgomery  had  now.  His  army  had 
melted  away.  Even  after  the  arrival  of  Arnold's  command,  the  ranks  were  so 
thinned  that  together  they  numbered  little  more  than  a  thousand  men  :  and 
yet  with  this  feeble  band,  who  had  left  their  blood  tracks  all  along  their 
march,  he  undertook  to  capture  the  strongest  walled  city  in  America.  Winter 
had  set  in  with  a  severity  almost  unknown  even  in  that  Hyperborean 
region ;  yet  with  an  unquenchable  ardor  Montgomery  thought  only  of 
success.  Cannon  planted  on  fields  of  ice  had  battered  the  walls  of  Quebec ; 
but  they  resisted  every  shock,  and  he  determined  to  carry  the  town  by 
storm.  As  the  gray  light  of  the  morning  of  the  last  day  of  the  year 
1775  came  dimly  creeping  over  the  snow- wreathed  city,  his  army  ad- 
vanced in  four  divisions*  One  was  led  by  Arnold ;  another  by  Mont- 
gomery himself;  while  the  others  were  merely  ruses  de  guerre.  Arnold 
pressed  through  into  the  city  with  the  desperation  of  his  well-known  valor. 
But  while  he  was  struggling  with  what  would  seem  to  others  an  impossibility, 
he  was  suddenly  wounded,  and  forced  to  retire.  As  the  gallant  Montgomery 
was  leading  on  a  detachment  of  his  division  up  those  rugged  and  dizzy  heights, 
infusing  his  own  soul  into  his  brave  comrades,  a  chance  shot  struck  him  dead. 
His  body  was  borne  away  down  the  icy  cliffs  on  the  boy  shoulders  of  the 
chivalric  Aaron  Burr.8  Four  hundred  of  his  men  were  killed  or  made  pris- 
oners :  but  their  fate  was  mitigated  by  the  humanity  of  Carlton,  which  left  a 
bright  spot  in  the  record  of  this  disastrous  campaign. 

Fox  Repels  the  Insult  of  Lord  North  to  the  Memory  of  Montgomery. — 
When  the  news  of  the  heroic  fall  of  Montgomery  reached  England,  in  reply 

1  Lossing,  Hist,  of  the  U.  S.,  pp.  241-242.  hero   to  be  conveyed  from  Quebec,  and  deposited  on 

the  8th  day  of  July  (18 18),  in  St.  Paul's  Church,  in  the 

3  This  city  of  New  York,  near  the  monument  erected  to  his 

Monument  is  erected  by  order  of  Congress,  memory  by  the  United  States.' 

General   Montgomery  left  no  children,  whom  '  the 

25th  of  January,  1776,  State,  in  gratitude  toward  their  father,   distinguished 

to  transmit  to  posterity  a  grateful  remembrance  of  the  with  every  mark  of  kindness  and  protection,'  as  Bocta 

patriotic     conduct,    enterprise,    and    perseverance    of  asserts.     His  widow  survived  him   more  than   half  a 

__  ,       _            ._                .,  century.     When  at  the  house  of  his  brother-in-law,  the 

Major-General  Richard  Montgomery,  late  Peter  R    Liyingston>  at  Rhinebeck,  a   few  years 

who,  after  a  series  of  successes  amid  the  most  discour-  ago,    I  saw   an  interesting  memento  of  the  lamented 

aging  difficulties,  Fell  in  the  attack  on  general.     A  day  or  two  before  he  left  home  to  join  the 

^ J"    ~        _          ,                         .  army  under  Schuyler,  he  was  walking  on  the  lawn  in 

Quebec,  31st  December,  1775,  aged  37  years.  the  rear  of  his  brother-in-law's  mansion  with  the  owner, 

The    following    is   the    inscription    upon    a  silver  and  as  they  came  near  the  house,  Montgomery  stuck  a 

plate  on  the  coffin  :   'The  State  of  New  York,  in  honor  willow   twig  in  the  ground,  and  said,  '  Peter,  let  that 

of  General   Richard  Montgomery,  who  fell  gloriously  grow  to  remember  me  by.'     It  did  grow,  and  is  now  a 

fighting  for  the  independence  and  liberty  of  the  United  willow  with  a  trunk  at  least  ten  feet  in  circumference. 

States  before  the  walls  of  Quebec   the  31st  of  Decern-  — Lossing's  Field  Book  of  the  Revolution,  vol.  L  p. 

ber,  I775»  caused   thes?  remains  of  the  distinguished  201. 


ENGLISH  TALENT  SIDES  WITH  AMERICA.  273 

to  a  eulogy  passed  upon  him  by  Edmund  Burke,  after  Lord  North  had  de- 
nounced him  as  ■  only  a  brave,  able,  humane  and  generous  rebel]  exclaiming, 
'  Curse  on  his  virtues ;  they  have  undone  his  country,'  Fox  uttered  those 
noble  words  :  '  The  term  rebel  is  no  certain  mark  of  disgrace.  All  the  great 
asserters  of  liberty,  the  saviours  of  their  country,  the  benefactors  of  mankind 
in  all  ages,  have  been  called  rebels.  We  owe  the  Constitution  which  enables 
us  to  sit  in  this  House,  to  a  rebellion.' 

The  Talent  of  England  on  the  Side  of  the  Colonies. — Although  the  king 
had  a  majority  of  two  to  one  in  the  House  of  Commons,  who  obsequiously 
voted  for  every  royal  measure,  yet  the  greatest  talent  in  that  imperial  body 
was  arrayed  against  him.  Some  of  its  clearest-headed  men  undisguisedly 
condemned  the  enlistment  of  foreign  troops  in  subjugating  the  Colonies. 
1  We  conceive,'  said  they,  '  the  calling  in  foreign  forces  to  decide  domestic 
quarrels,  to  be  a  measure  both  disgraceful  and  dangerous.'  A  grand  prin- 
ciple was  at  stake,  in  which  Englishmen  were  as  deeply  interested  as  the 
Colonists  themselves.  Fox,  Rockingham,  and  all  the  strong  men  in  the 
minority,  defended  the  rights  of  the  Colonies  as  the  bulwark  of  English 
freedom.  They  declared  that  'if  America  could  not  be  retained  with  justice, 
England  could  not  afford  to  keep  her  at  all,' — that  '  to  hold  the  Colonies  by 
force  alone,  would  prove  the  overthrow  of  the  British  Constitution.'  In  the 
autumn,  1775,  the  Duke  of  Manchester  said  in  the  House  of  Lords,  'The  vio- 
lence of  the  times  has  wrested  America  from  the  British  crown,  and  spurned 
the  jewel  because  the  setting  appeared  uncouth : '  while  the  bold  Duke  of 
Grafton,  who  knew  that  he  could  preserve  his  independence  only  at  the  cost 
of  his  office,  reiterated  his  protest  against  the  employment  of  foreign  troops, 
and  resigned  the  privy  seal.  It  mattered  not  that  the  whole  moral  force  of 
the  empire  was  levelled  against  the  policy  of  the  king ;  no  ministry  could  live 
without  carrying  it  out.  When  it  was  thoroughly  understood  on  both  sides, 
that  the  will  of  the  monarch  and  not  the  Constitution  of  England  was  the  law 
of  the  land,  the  case  was  made  up. 

The  Colonists  Declared  Outlaws. — Ever  after,  all  the  legislation  of  Parlia- 
ment was  directed  against  the  Colonies  as  rebels,  and  of  necessity,  all  the  meas- 
ures of  the  Colonial  Congress  contemplated  the  King  of  England  as  the 
enemy  of  America. 

In  the  month  of  November,  1 776,  Parliament  not  only  declared  the  Colonies 
rebels,  but  prohibited  all  intercourse  with  them  ;  ignored  their  civil  existence  ; 
authorized  the  destruction  of  their  property  on  the  high  seas  ;  and  on  the 
ruins  of  the  whole  system  of  social  life  in  America,  they  erected  the  barbar- 
ous structure  of  martial  law.  A  force  of  soldiers  and  seamen  of  more  than 
iifty  thousand  men,  was  voted  for  the  war  in  America ;  and  after  exhausting 
every  agency  of  diplomacy,  and  seducing  by  the  corrupting  power  of  gold 
seventeen  thousand  German  troops — brutal  and  bloodthirsty,  ignorant  and 
revengeful,  despised  by  the  regular  troops  of  the  British  army,  fit  instruments 
18 


274  FINAL  SEPARA  TION  APPR OA  CHING. 

for  the  darkest  and  most  infamous  deeds  of  the  darkest  and  most  infamous 
of  wars — seventeen  thousand  such  mercenaries,  were  on  their  way  to  the 
American  shores ! 

Tory  and  Indian  Allies. — Two  other  elements  befitting  the  occasion,  and 
in  harmony  with  the  spirit  of  the  undertaking,  were  also  invoked.  Every 
allurement  to  win  them  over  to  the  side  of  the  crown  was  presented  to  the 
American  Tories — money,  estates,  the  favor  of  the  king,  and  all  the  influences 
that  could  be  brought  to  bear,  were  enlisted.  All  the  base,  of  course,  yielded 
to  the  temptations  ;  and  with  them,  large  numbers  of  men  of  rank  and  influ- 
ence, who  had  held  office  under  the  crown,  and  who  had  large  interests  to 
protect,  became  the  easy  and  early  allies  of  the  king.  Every  man  in  the 
Colonies  who  had  his  price,  could  command  it.  It  was  so  when  the  first  rup- 
ture took  place,  and  it  remained  so  till  the  close  of  the  war. 

But  the  British  name  was  to  receive  a  deeper  stain  from  another  cause, 
which  I  shall  only  touch  on  here,  reserving  for  a  future  chapter  its  fuller  illus- 
tration. From  the  outset  one  of  the  main  reliances  of  Great  Britain  in  the 
prosecution  of  the  American  war,  was  the  employment  of  the  savages  of  the 
soil.  This  dreadful  policy  was  clearly  and  fully  determined  on  when  the  war 
began  ;  it  never  was  departed  from  ;  it  was  never  modified ;  it  was  steadily 
persisted  in  to  the  end,  as  the  facts  will  hereafter  show. 

The  Hour  for  the  Final  Separation  Approaching. — The  time  had  come 
for  the  outlawed  Colonies  to  assert  their  rights  in  a  way  that  could  not 
possibly  be  misunderstood.  There  was  no  longer  a  peace  party  in 
America.  On  the  18th  of  September,  John  Adams  wrote  to  his  wife  : 
4  There  is  no  idea  of  submission  here  in  anybody's  head.  .  .  .  When  the  horrid 
:news  was  brought  here  of  the  bombardment  of  Boston,  which  made  us  com- 
pletely miserable  for  two  days,  we  saw  proofs  both  of  the  sympathy  and  the 
a-esolution  of  the  continent.  .  .  .  War  !  war  I  war  !  was  the  cry,  and  it  was 
pronounced  in  a  tone  that  would  have  done  honor  to  the  oratory  of  a  Briton, 
<©r  a  Roman.  If  it  had  proved  true,  you  would  have  heard  the  thunder  of  an 
American  Congress.'  A  week  later  he  said  :  '  We  have  had  as  great  questions 
discussed  as  ever  engaged  the  attention  of  men,  and  an  infinite  number  of 
them.'  At  a  still  later  date :  '  No  assembly  ever  had  a  greater  number  of 
great  objects  before  them.  Provinces,  nations,  empires,  are  small  things  before 
us.  I  wish  we  were  good  architects.'  It  was  in  this  reverent  and  determined 
spirit  that  they  '  built  wiser  than  they  knew.'  Congress  proved  itself  equal  to 
the  trial.  One  by  one  the  ties  which  bound  the  two  nations  had  given  way. 
The  fearful  and  timid  had  grown  resolute  ;  the  feeble  strong.  The  last  plea 
for  postponement  of  the  issue  had  been  heard.  Henceforth  it  was  to  be 
deeds,  not  words.  The  secret  of  the  nation's  power,  when  it  spoke,  was  to 
be  the  secret  of  the  eloquence  of  Demosthenes — Action.  A  naval  establishment 
had  been  commenced  ;  a  board  of  war,  and  one  of  finance  appointed  ;  commis- 
sions were  issued  to  privateers  ;  a  declaration  of  the  causes  for  taking  up  arms 


THE  AMERICAN  FLAG  FIRST  RAISED. 


2  75 


had  been  made  ;  bills  of  credit  had  been  issued  ; '  provision  had  been  made 
for  strengthening  the  sinews  of  war ;  an  agent  had  been  sent  to  represent  our 
cause  among  the  friendly  nations  of  Europe — and  perhaps,  above  all,  Washing- 
ton had  become  assured  of  the  unlimited  confidence  of  his  countrymen,  and 
the  nation  was  generally  prepared  for  the  final  step  beyond  which  lay  inde 
pendence  or  death. 

The  Union  Flag  first  Raised. — On  New  Year' s  morning,  1776,  Washing- 
ton raised  the  Union  Flag  a  over  his  headquarters  at  Cambridge.  It  was  the 
first  time  the  thirteen  alternate  stripes  of  red  and  white  3  had  been  unfurled, 
and  it  was  greeted  with  the  shouts  of  an  army  waiting  eagerly  for  battle. 

The  Enemy  Driven  from  Boston. — Ever  since  the  British  army  had  been 
driven  into  Boston,  it  had  been  held  a  close  prisoner.  Washington  had  pos- 
sessed neither  the  armament  nor  munitions  adequate  to  dislodge  the  enemy. 


1  The  Resolution  of  the  Continental  Congress, 
providing  for  the  emission  of  bills,  was  adopted 
on  the  22d  of  June,  1775.  The  bills  were  printed  and 
issued  soon  after,  and  other  emissions  were  authorized, 
from  time  to  time,  during  about  four  years.  At  the  be- 
ginning of  1780,  Congress  issued  two  hundred  millions 
of  dollars  in  paper  money.  After  the  second  year,  these 
bills  began  to  depreciate  ;  and  in  1780,  forty  paper  dol- 
lars were  worth  only  one  in  specie.  At  the  close  of 
1781,  they  were  worthless.  They  had  performed  a 
temporary  good,  but  were  finally  productive  of  great 
public  evil,  and  much  individual  suffering.  Some  of 
these  bills  are  yet  in  existence,  and  are  considered 
great  curiosities.  They  are  rudely  engraved,  and 
printed  on  thick  paper,  which  caused  the  British  to  call 
it  'the  paste-board  money  of  the  rebels.' — Lossing's  U. 
S.%  p.  245. 

2  That  flag  was  composed  of  thirteen  stripes,  alter- 
nate red  and  white,  symbolizing  the  thirteen  revolted 
colonies.  In  one  corner  was  the  device  of  the  British 
Union  Flag,  namely,  the  cross  of  St.  George,  composed 
of  a  horizontal  and  perpendicular  bar,  and  the  cross  of 
St.  Andrew  (representing  Scodand),  which  is  in  the 
form  of  X.  It  was  the  appearance  of  that  symbol  of  the 
British  union  that  misled  Howe.  On  the  14th  of  June, 
1777,  Congress  ordered,  "  thirteen  stars,  white,  in  a 
blue  field,"  to  be  put  in  the  place  of  the  British  union 
device.  Such  is  the  design  of  our  flag  at  the  present 
day.  A  star  has  been  added  for  every  new  State  ad- 
mitted into  the  Union,  while  the  original  number  of 
stripes  is  retained. — Lossing's  History  of  the  U.  S.,  p. 
245- 

8  The  National  Lyric  of  Joseph  Rodman  Drake, 
is  entitled  to  go  with 

THE  AMERICAN  FLAG. 

When  Freedom,  from  her  mountain  height. 

Unfurled  her  standard  to  the  air, 
She  tore  the  azure  robe  of  night, 

And  set  the  stars  of  glory  there  ! 
She  mingled  with  its  gorgeous  dyes 
The  milky  baldric  of  the  skies, 
And  striped  its  pure  celestial  white 
With  streakings  of  the  morning  light ; 
Then,  from  his  mansion  in  the  sun, 
She  called  her  eagle  bearer  down, 
And  gave  into  his  mighty  hand 
The  symbol  of  her  chosen  land  ! 

Majestic  monarch  of  the  cloud  ! 

Who  rear'st  aloft  thy  regal  form, 
To  hear  the  tempest  trumpings  loud, 
And  see  the  lightning-lances  driven, 

When  stride  the  warriors  of  the  storm, 
Aad  rolls  the  thunder-drum  of  heaven  ! 


Child  of  the  sun  !  to  thee  'tis  given 
To  guard  the  banner  of  the  free, 
To  hover  in  the  sulphur  smoke, 
To  ward  away  the  battle  stroke, 
And  bid  its  blendings  shine  afar, 
Like  rainbows  on  the  cloud  of  war, 
The  harbingers  of  victory. 

Flag  of  the  brave  !  thy  folds  shall  fly, 
The  sign  of  hope  and  triumph  high, 
When  speaks  the  signal  trumpet  tone, 
And  the  long  line  comes  gleaming  on, 
(Ere  yet  the  life-blood  warm  and  wet 
Has  dimmed  the  glistening  bayonet) 
Each  soldier  eye  shall  brightly  turn 
To  where  thy  skyborn  glories  burn, 
And,  as  his  springing  steps  advance, 
Catch  war  and  vengeance  from  the  glance 
And  when  the  cannon  mouthings  loud, 
Heave  in  wild  wreaths  the  battle  shroud, 
And  gory  sabres  rise  and  fall, 
Like  shoots  of  flame  on  midnight's  pall ; 
There  shall  thy  meteor-glances  glow, 

And  cowering  foes  shall  shrink  beneath, 
Each  gallant  arm  that  strikes  below 

That  lovely  messenger  of  death. 

Flag  of  the  seas  !  on  ocean  wave 
4  Thy  stars  shall  glitter  o'er  the  brave ; 
When  death,  careering  on  the  gale, 
Sweeps  darkly  round  the  bellied  sail, 
And  frighted  waves  rush  wildly  back 
Before  the  broadside's  reeling  rack, 
Each  dying  wanderer  of  the  sea 
Shall  look  at  once  to  heaven  and  thee, 
And  smile  to  see  thy  splendors  fly 
In  triumph  o'er  his  closing  eye. 

Flag  of  the  free  heart's  hope  and  home, 

By  angel  hands  to  valor  given  ; 
Thy  stars  have  lit  the  welkin  dome 

And  all  thy  hues  were  born  in  heaven  I 
Forever  float  that  standard  sheet ! 
Where  breathes  the  foe  but  falls  before  us? 
With  freedom's  soil  beneath  our  feet, 
And  freedom's  banner  streaming  o'er  us  ?  • 

*  The  last  four  lines  of  The  American  Flag  are  fcy 
Halleck,  in  place  of  the  following  by  Drake,  whit  I 
originally  closed  the  poem  : — 

And  fixed  as  yonder  orb  divine, 

That  saw  thy  bannered  blaze  unfurled, 

Shall  thy  proud  stars  resplendent  shine, 
The  guard  and  glo>-y  of  the  world. 


ejt>  WASHINGTON  MARCHES  TO  NEW  YORK. 

But  he  was  slowly  and  surely  making  his  preparations,  and  an  end  was  to  be 
put  to  the  siege.  The  enemy  was  to  be  driven  out  on  the  sea,  or  forced  into 
battle.  Under  his  own  immediate  superintendence,  the  commander-in-chief 
had,  on  the  night  of  the  4th  of  March,  constructed  a  redoubt  on  Dorchestei 
Heights,  from  which,  in  the  morning,  the  whole  British  shipping  was  menaced 
with  destruction.  The  English  admiral,  and  commanding-general,  saw  the 
imminent  danger,  and  precipitately  anchors  were  lifted  and  sails  spread  for 
Halifax.  They  abandoned  the  port  and  the  city,  carrying  with  them  every 
man  the  Colony  of  Massachusetts  was  glad  to  spare;  and  while  the  fleet  was 
still  in  view,  orders  were  given  for  the  American  army  to  move,  and  Washing- 
ton led  them  in  triumph  into  the  liberated  city.  "  New  England  was  always 
true  to  Washington  ;  the  whole  mass  of  her  population,  to  the  end  of  the  war 
and  during  all  his  life,  heaved  and  swelled  with  sympathy  for  his  fortunes  ;  he 
could  not  make  a  sign  to  her  for  aid,  but  her  sons  rose  up  to  his  support ;  noi 
utter  advice  to  his  country,  but  they  gave  it  reverence  and  heed.  And  never 
was  so  great  a  result  obtained  at  so  small  a  cost  of  human  life.  The  putting 
the  British  army  to  flight  was  the  first  decisive  victory  of  the  industrious  mid- 
dling class  over  the  most  powerful  representative  of  the  mediaeval  aristocracy  ; 
and  the  whole  number  of  New  England  men  killed  in  the  siege  after  Wash- 
ington took  the  command,  was  kss  than  twenty ;  the  liberation  of  New  Eng- 
land cost  altogether  less  than  two  hundred  lives  in  battle ;  and  the  triumphant 
general,  as  he  looked  around,  enjoyed  the  serenest  delight,  for  he  saw  no 
mourners  among  those  who  greeted  his  entry  after  his  bloodless  victory."  1 

Washington  Marches  his  Artny  to  New  York. — No  sooner  had  Boston 
been  placed  in  a  state  of  security,  than  he  prepared  to  set  the  main  body  of 
his  army  in  motion  for  New  York,  which  he  supposed  to  be  the  offensive 
point  towards  which  Howe  had  before  sailed  with  an  armament.  Already, 
during  the  previous  January,  General  Sir  Henry  Clinton,  had  sailed  on  a 
secret  expedition,  as  was  believed  for  the  same  point ;  but  Washington  had  al- 
ready despatched  General  Lee  to  Connecticut,  where  he  was  to  raise  troops 
and  watch  the  movements  of  the*  British  commander.  In  following  down 
the  coast,  he  was  so  successful,  that  when  in  March,  Clinton  reached  Sandy 
Hook,  Lee  had  the  same  day  entered  the  city  of  New  York.  Thus  defeated 
in  his  purpose,  Clinton  sailed  for  the  South. 

The  Union  Flag  Floats  over  New  York. — New  York  was  already  in  insur- 
rection. The  '  Sons  of  Liberty '  had  seized  the  cannon  on  the  fort  at  the 
Battery,  then  called  Fort  George,  and  driven  the  royal  Governor  Tryon  on 
board  the  British  man-of-war  Asia.  On  the  14th  of  April,  Washington 
reached  New  York,  and  began  to  fortify  the  town  and  its  neighborhood,  and 
guard  the  passes  of  the  Highlands,  as  far  as  West  Point  on  the  Hudson. 
General  Lee,  having  been  appointed  to  the  command  of  the  Southern  forces, 
had  left  his  troops  in  charge  of  General  Lord  Stirling.8 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  viii.  pp.  304-305.  ant  of  the  Scotch  Earl  of  Stirling,  already  spoken  of 

*  William  Alexander  Lord  Stirling  was  a  descend-    as  Sir  William  Alexander,  who  was,  in   1633,  made 


PATRIOTISM  AND  VALOR  OF  SOUTH  CAROLINA.  277 

Feeble  as  now  were  the  resources  at  the  command  of  General  Washington, 
— with  no  fleet,  like  the  enemy,  to  transport  his  forces  from  point  to  point,  and 
uncertain  where  the  enemy  might  strike, — the  exigencies  of  his  position  began 
to  develop  those  wonderful  abilities  as  a  commander,  which  inspired  the 
whole  nation  with  such  absolute  confidence,  but  which  fill  us  with  amazement 
at  the  distance  of  a  hundred  years,  even  when  we  have  so  faint  a  conception 
of  the  embarrassments  which  surrounded  him. 

The  Revolution  Moves  Southward. — Two  points  divert  our  attention  for  a 
moment.  After  the  fall  of  Montgomery,  and  the  failure  of  the  second  attempt 
on  Quebec,  the  desolations  of  winter,  the  insufficiency  of  clothing,  and  the 
wastings  of  famine,  had  paralyzed  our  forces  on  the  northern  frontier.  One 
post  after  another  was  taken,  and  before  the  1st  of  July,  1776,  all  Canada  had 
been  recovered  by  the  British.  The  expedition,  with  the  retreat,  had  cost  us 
more  than  a  thousand  men ;  but  it  was  attended  with  still  more  disastrous  re- 
sults to  the  enemy.  Carlton  had  indeed  saved  Quebec  at  a  heavy  loss,  but 
he  had  been  utterly  foiled  in  his  purpose  of  cutting  his  way  through  to  Lake 
Champlain,  from  which,  by  effecting  a  union  with  the  British  forces  on  the 
Hudson,  he  intended  to  break  up  all  communication  between  New  England, 
and  the  Colony  of  New  York.  Washington  had  in  the  meantime  kept  his 
eyes  steadily  fixed  upon  the  line  of  the  Hudson,  knowing  how  much  his 
success  would  afterwards  depend  upon  holding  West  Point — the  key  to  the 
northern  frontier — and  which,  in  the  campaign  of  New  Jersey,  was  to  be  the 
gateway  of  communication  between  him  and  New  England. 

Patriotism  and  Valor  of  South  Carolina. — Although  the  Southern  Colonies, 
owing  chiefly  to  their  distance  from  the  early  scenes  of  the  Revolution,  but 
partly  to  the  scattered  distribution  of  the  population,  had  not  been  so  early  in 
the  field,  yet  they  were  fired  with  the  same  common  spirit  that  inflamed  the 
breasts  of  their  New  England  brethren.  Signs  of  insubordination,  revolution, 
md  independence  were  manifest  all  through  the  South,  and  had  attracted  the 
special  attention  of  the  British  Government.  Consequently  a  fleet,  under 
Admiral  Parker,  destined  for  the  reduction  of  the  Southern  Colonies,  had 
reached  Cape  Fear,  where  Clinton  assumed  the  command  of  all  the  land 
forces.  On  the  4th  of  June,  the  squadron  arrived  off  Charleston.  But  Gov- 
ernor Rutledge,  who  was  the  soul  of  Southern  independence,  had  already  col- 
lected six  thousand  men,  who  had  fortified  the  city  and  its  neighborhood,  and 
erected  a  strong  fort  on  Sullivan's  Island.  Before  the  appearance  of  the  fleet, 
this  fort,  constructed  of  palmetto  logs,  had  been  garrisoned  by  five  hundred 
chivalric  men,  under  Colonel  William  Moultrie.  Having  taken  their  position 
on  the  morning  of  June  28th,  a  combined  attack  was  made  by  land  and  water, 
and  at  an  early  hour  the  English  vessels  were  pouring  broadsides  from  heavy 

Earl  of  Stirling,  and  to  whom,  in  1621,  King  James,  The  officer  spoken  of  above  was  born  in  the  city  at 

as   sovereign  of    Scotland,    had,  under   the    Scottish  New  Vork,  in   1726.     Being  attached    to   the   patriot 

seal,  granted  s>.  charter  for  the  whole  territory  eastward  cause,  he  early  joined  the  Continental  army,  in  which 

"of  the  State  of  Maine,  under  the  tide  of  Nova  Scotia  he  served  as  an  active  officer  during  the  Revolutionary 

or  New  Scotland.  War,  dying  in  1783,  at  the  age  of  iifty-seven. 


278  CHIVALRY  OF  JASPER. 

4 

guns  into  the  fort.  A  desperate  attempt  was  also  made  by  Clinton  to  force  a 
passage  across  a  narrow  neck  of  land  which  divided  Sullivan's  from  Long  Is 
land:  but  Colonel  Thompson's  little  battery  at  the  east  end  of  Sullivan's 
Island  resisted  the  movement ;  and  while  the  balls  from  the  fleet  lost  them- 
selves when  they  struck  into  the  palmetto  fort,  as  though  they  had  been  shot 
into  a  fortress  of  cotton  bales,  its  cannon  worked  havoc  among  the  British  ves- 
sels. During  a  battle  which  raged  for  nearly  ten  hours,  the  heroic  Moultrie 
defended  the  place  with  so  much  skill  and  daring,  that  the  British  fleet  was 
compelled  to  withdraw,  and  night  shut  down  on  the  brave  defenders  still  mas- 
ters of  the  fort.  Only  two  of  the  garrison  had  been  killed,  and  twenty-two 
wounded,  while  the  slaughter  of  the  enemy  had  been  fearful.  In  wounded  and 
dead  they  had  lost  two  hundred  and  twenty-five  men. 

Chivalry  of  Jasper. — One  incident  of  that  day  is  worth  relating,  not  only 
in  honor  of  the  hero  of  the  story,  but  because  it  was  a  fair  indication  of  the 
spirit  of  genuine  chivalry  which  the  sons  of  the  South  displayed  all  through 
the  Revolution.  Hosts  of  spectators  had  gathered  on  the  shore  to  watch  the 
tide  of  battle.  In  the  deadliest  hour  of  the  conflict,  suddenly,  as  the  smoke 
rolled  off  from  the  palmetto  fortress,  the  American  colors  were  no  longer  to 
be  seen.  Alarm  spread  everywhere,  and  every  eye  was  strained  in  dread  to  see 
the  British  marines  mounting  the  fortress  with  the  flag  of  St.  George  in  their 
hands.  A  lull  for  a  few  moments  came  over  the  land  and  the  water;  even 
the  British  seemed  to  think  the  day  was  won.  But  just  then,  a  sergeant — 
Jasper  was  his  name — sprang  over  the  wall,  and  a  moment  after  had  climbed 
back,  and  was  waving  the  American  standard  from  the  top  of  the  fortress. 
The  flag-staff  only  had  been  shot  away,  and  all  could  see  the  young  Amer- 
ican waving  the  national  ensign  in  defiance.1 

Thus  did  South  Carolina  cover  herself  with  glory  in  the  first  bloody  con- 
test she  had  to  wage  against  the  common  foe  ;  and  so  terrible  was  the  chas- 
tisement inflicted,  that  more  than  two  years  passed  by,  before  the  torch  of 
war  was  again  lighted  by  the  British  beyond  the  Roanoke.  It  was  an  answer- 
ing shout  of  victory  sent  back  in  response  to  the  thunders  of  Bunker  Hill. 
From  this  hour  the  two  extremities  of  the  little,  narrow,  inhabited  belt  on  the 
verge  of  the  Atlantic,  which  began  to.be  known  as  the  Thirteen  United 
Colonies,  were  transported  by  a  common  enthusiasm. 

Thomas  Paine — the  Influence  of  His  Political  Writings. — Any  account 
of  the  progress  of  public  opinion  towards  the  consummation  which  was 
reached  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  would  be  far  from  complete,  if 
one  prominent  character,  yet  unmentioned,  should  be  left  out  of  the  scenes. 
Time  enough  has  gone  by  since  the  death  of  Thomas  Paine,  to  enable  any 

1  A  few  days  afterwards,  Governor  Rutledge,  took  General  Lee  advised  Moultrie  to  abandon  the  fort : 
his  own  sword  from  his  side  and  presented  it  to  the  but  that  brave  officer  would  not  desert  it,  and  was  re- 
brave  Jasper ;  he  also  offered  him  a  lieutenant's  com-  warded  with  victory.  The  ladies  of  Charleston  pre 
mission,  which  the  young  man  modestly  declined,  be-  sented  his  regiment  with  a  pair  of  elegant  colors,  and 
cause  he  could  neither  read  nor  write,  saying,  '  I  am  not  the  slaughter-pen,  as  Lee  ironically  called  Fort  Sul- 
fa to  keep  officers'  company  ;  I  am  only  a  sergeant.'  livan,  was  named  Fort  Moultrie. — Lossing's  Hist,  oj 

When  the  British  approached  for  the  bombardment,  the  U,  S.t  p.  249. 


EARLY  HISTORY  OF   THOMAS  PAINE.  279 

candid  writer  to  do  justice  to  his  character.  Very  little  interest  is  now  felt  in 
his  personal  history  ;  nor  in  a  work  like  this  has  he  any  claim  for  recognition 
beyond  the  influence  of  his  political  writings  on  the  public  mind  of  America, 
during  the  War  for  Independence.  That  influence  was  far  greater  than  the 
mass  of  men  in  our  times  can  readily  understand.  With  the  alleged  depravity 
of  his  tastes  and  habits  in  later  life,  or  the  bitterness  with  which  he  assailed 
Christianity,  and  those  who,  bearing  the  Christian  name,  looked  upon  its 
Founder  as  the  hope  and  security  of  the  world,  I  have  nothing  to  do  in  this 
work.  The  earth  has  twice  closed  over  the  ashes  of  the  so-called  reviler  and 
debauchee :  but  the  gratitude  of  the  friends  of  civil  liberty  for  the  great  ser- 
vices of  its  champion,  will  survive  the  memory  of  the  odium  which  may  rest 
upon  his  religious  opinions,  or  the  aspersions  which  may  have  been  cast  on  his 
personal  character.  That  gratitude  will  fade  away,  only  when  the  priceless 
value  of  self-government  shall  no  longer  live  among  men. 

Thomas  Paine  was  born  the  son  of  a  Quaker  staymaker  at  Thetford,  Eng 
land,  in  January,  1737.  He  learned  the  trade  of  his  father,  and  followed  it 
for  a  while  ;  but  his  restless  spirit  doomed  him  to  a  restless  life.  The  tem- 
pest was  his  chosen  element — the  atmosphere  of  revolution  was  his  native  air. 
He  was  sent  into  the  world  to  make  trouble  for  despotism  ;  and  he  achieved 
this  so  well,  it  is  a  matter  of  less  consequence  what  else  he  did,  or  left  un- 
done. In  his  thirty-fourth  year,  he  found  himself  floating  about  in  the  wilder- 
ness of  London.  With  no  completeness  of  education,  and  no  great  range  of 
reading,  he  was  still  a  close  watcher  of  political  events  in  every  quarter  of  the 
world.  The  growing  troubles  of  the  Colonies  early  attracted  his  attention, 
and  he  seized  hold  of  all  the  political  news  from  America  with  the  greatest 
avidity.  He  sought  out  Franklin,  then  the  colonial  agent  in  London.  With 
that  intuitive  perception  of  character  which  so  distinguished  the  philosopher, 
he  recommended  him  to  come  to  America,  *  for  there,'  said  he,  '  you  will  find 
quite  enough  to  do.'  This  determined  his  fortunes  ;  and  at  the  age  of  thirty- 
seven,  he  sailed  for  Philadelphia,  with  a  letter  from  Franklin  in  his  pocket. 
His  first  plan  was  to  open  a  school  for  the  higher  education  of  young  ladies. 
But  falling  in  with  Aitkin,  a  bookseller,  it  was  proposed  to  start  a  magazine 
for  which  Paine  wrote  a  prospectus,  and  of  which  he  became  editor.  His  first 
article  of  any  importance,  was  a  contribution  on  the  subject  of  Negro  Slavery 
to  Bradford's  newspaper.  This  attracted  the  attention  of  Benjamin  Rush, 
then,  next  to  Franklin,  the  foremost  citizen  of  Pennsylvania.1  This  essay  had 
all  the  strong  marks  of  Paine's  vigor  of  thought,  and  style.  '  I  did  homage  to 
his  principles  and  his  pen,'  wrote  Rush.     Seeing  what  he  could  do,  the  illus- 

1  Benjamin  Rush  was  one  of  the  most  eminent  men  him  the  imperishable  crown  of  a  true  philanthropist, 

of  his  time,  as  a  physician,  a  man  of  science,  and  an  He  founded  the  Philadelphia  Dispensary  in  1786,  and 

active  patriot  during  the  whole  Revolution.     He  was  he  was  also  one  of  the  principal  founders  of  Dickinson 

born  twelve  miles  from  Philadelphia,  in  1745.     He  was  College,  at  Carlisle,  Pennsylvania.     He  was  president 

sducat«?-J  at  Princeton,  completed  his  scientific  studies  of  the  American   Society  for  the  Abolition  of  Slavery  ; 

in  Edinburgh,  and  after  his  return,  he  soon  rose  to  the  of  the  Philadelphia  Medical  Society  ;  vice-president  of 

highest  eminence  in  his  profession.    He  was  the  recipi-  the  Philadelphia  Bible  Society  ;  and  one  of  the  vice- 

ent  )f  many  honors,  and  as  a  member  of  the  Continen-  presidents  of  the  American  Philosophical  Society.     He 

tal   Congress,   in  1776,  he  advocated  and  signed  the  died  in  April,  1813,  at  the  age  of  almost  sixry-eighl 

Declaration  of  Independence.     His  labors  during  the  years. — Lossing's  Hist.  0/ the  U.  S.,  p.  250. 
ptcvalence  of  yellow  fever  in  Philadelphia  in  1793,  gave 


280  INFLUENCE  OF  PAINE S  POLITICAL   WRITINGS. 

trious  physician  proposed  to  him  to  write  a  work  to  prepare  the  American 
mind  for  independence.  This  was  towards  the  close  of  1774.  After  reading 
the  manuscript,  he  advised  the  author  to  show  it  to  Franklin  and  Samuel 
Adams,  ■  since,'  said  he,  '  they  hold  the  same  views  and  principles.'  , 

Franklin  approved  of  it  heartily,  and  it  soon  appeared  as  it  came  from 
Paine' s  pen,  with  only  one  passage  struck  out,  for  some  reason  which  Doctor 
Rush  could  not  explain  j — ■  since,'  he  says,  '  it  was  one  of  the  most  striking 
passages  in  the  essay': — <a  greater  absurdity  cannot  be  conceived  of,  than 
three  millions  of  people  running  to  their  sea-coast,  every  time  a  ship  arrives 
from  London,  to  know  what  portion  of  liberty  they  should  enjoy.'  It  was 
agreed  that  the  paper  would  ■  help  America,  and  make  trouble  for  England.' 
'What  shall  be  the  title?'  inquired  Rush.  'Call  it  Plain  Truth,'  answered 
Paine.  ■  I  think,'  said  the  Doctor,  '  I  have  a  better  title  :  why  not  call  it  Com- 
mon Sense?'  Thus  christened,  Robert  Bell,  'an  intelligent  Scotch  bookseller 
and  printer  in  Philadelphia,  whom  I  knew,'  said  Dr.  Rush,  ■  to  be  as  high  toned 
as  Mr.  Paine  upon  the  subject  of  American  independence,'  and  bold  enough 
withal  to  risk  its  publication,  brought  it  out.  He  continues  :— '  Common 
Sense  bursted  from  the  press  in  a  few  days  with  an  effect  which  has  rarely 
been  produced  by  types  and  paper  in  any  age  or  country.1  1 

1  This  pamphlet  of  forty  octavo  pages,  holding  out  relief  by  proposing 
independence  to  an  oppressed  and  despairing  people,  was  published  in 
January,  1776.  Speaking  the  language  which  the  Colonists  had  felt,  but  nolj 
thought,  its  popularity,  terrible  in  its  consequences  to  the  parent  country,  was 
unexampled  in  the  history  of  the  press.2  At  first,  involving  the  Colonists,  it 
was  thought,  in  the  crime  of  rebellion,  and  pointing  to  a  road  leading  inevitably 
to  ruin,  it  was  read  with  indignation  and  alarm  :  but  when  the  reader — and 
everybody  read  it — recovering  from  the  first  shock,  reperused  it,  its  arguments 
nourishing  his  feelings,  and  appealing  to  his  pride,  reanimated  his  hopes,  and 
satisfied  his  understanding,  that  Common  Sense,  backed  by  the  resources  and 
force  of  the  Colonies,  poor  and  feeble  as  they  were,  could  alone  rescue  them 
from  the  unqualified  oppression  with  which  they  were  threatened.  The  un- 
known author,  in  the  moments  of  enthusiasm  which  succeeded,  was  hailed  as 
an  angel  sent  from  heaven  to  save  from  all  the  horrors  of  slavery,  by  his  timely, 
powerful,  and  unerring  counsels,  a  faithful,  but  abused,  a  brave,  but  a  misre- 
presented people.3 

1  Alluding  to  the  predominant  wishes  of  the  Colo-  of  the  people,  it  produced  surprising  effects.       Many 

nists  soon  after  his  arrival,  Paine  says  in  the  Seventh  thousands  were  convinced,   and   were  led  to  approve 

number  of  the  Crisis  : — '  I  found  the  disposition  of  the  and  long  for  a  separation  from  the  mother  country  ; 

people  such  that  they  might  have  been  led  by  a  thread,  though  that  measure,  a  few  months  before,  was  not  only 

and  governed   by  a  reed.     Their  attachment  to  Britain  foreign  from  their  wishes,  but  the  object  of  their  abhor- 

was  obstinate,  and  it  was  at  that  time  a  kind  of  treason  rence,  the    current  suddenly  became  so  strong   in   its 

to  speak  against  it ;  they  disliked  the  ministry,  but  they  favor,  that  it  bore  down  all  before  it. — Ramsay's  Revo- 

esteemed  the  nation.     Their  idea  of  grievance  operated  lution,  vol.  i.  pp.  336-37,  London,  1793. 
without  resentment,  and  their  single  object  was  recon-  The  publications  which  have  appeared  have  greatly 

ciliation.'  promoted   the  spirit  of  independency,   but  no  one  so 

Also  in  the  Crisis  number  Three  : — 'Independence  much  as  the  pamphlet,  under  the  signature  of  Common 

was  a  doctrine  scarce  and  rare,  even  towards  the  con-  Sense,  written  by  Mr.  Thomas  Paine,  an  Englishman, 

elusion  of  the  year  1775.     All  our  politics  had   been  Nothing  could  have  been  better  timed  than  this  per- 

founded  on  the  hope  or  expectation  of  making  the  mat-  formance.     It  has  produced  most  astonishing  effects. — 

ter  up — a  hope  which,  though  general  on  the  side  of  Gordon's    Revolution,     vol.    ii.    p.    78,     New    York, 

America,  had  never  entered  the  head  or  heart  of  the  1794. 
British  Court.'  *   The  Life  of  Thomas  Paine,  by  James  Cheet- 

3  Nothing  could  be  better  timed  than  the  per-  ham.     New  York.     1809. 
formance.     In  union  with  the  feelings  and  sentiments 


COMMON  SENSE  AND  THE  CRISIS.  281 

No  man  of  his  day  wrote  with  so  much  power  as  Thomas  Paine.  He 
was  the  boldest  political  thinker  living.  He  was  a  stranger  to  elegance  ol  dic- 
tion, which  he  was  indisposed  to  cultivate.  But  he  thought  clearly,  and  wrote 
in  sound,  plain,  forcible  language.  Every  sentence  was  struck  off  with  the 
strength  and  heat,  and  went  with  the  ring  of  the  blacksmith's  anvil.  From 
the  pen  of  an  Irving,  or  Chesterfield,  those  terrible  leaves  would  have  fallen 
upon  the  popular  mind,  as  gently  as  the  downiest  feathers,  and  as  cold  as  the 
gauziest  snow-flakes.  From  the  heated  laboratory  of  Paine,  they  struck  like 
the  thunderbolts  of  Jove.  The  pamphlet  set  the  national  heart  on  fire.  The 
country  was  ready  for  it,  as  the  prairie  is  made  ready  by  a  long  drought  for 
the  first  kindling  spark.  Since  the  days  of  Peter  the  wondrous  Hermit,  no 
such  words  had  been  uttered  in  the  ears  of  men.  All  glory  to  the  man  who 
uttered  them.  ■  Whatever  excesses  Paine  may  have  been  guilty  of  in  later  life, 
he  is  universally  believed  to  have  indulged  in  none  at  this  period.  Those  were 
the  days  of  a  higher  inspiration  in  the  soul  of  the  author  of  Common  Sense, 
and  The  Crisis,  than  ever  springs  from  the  fitful  excitement  of  alcohol.2  To 
state  that  large  editions  of  Paine' s  '  Common  Sense'  followed  each  other  in 
quick  succession  from  the  press,  gives  us  but  a  faint  idea  of  its  circulation. 
The  principal  newspapers  of  the  country  reprinted  the  most  striking  portions  ; 
extracts  were  made  in  all  the  correspondence  of  the  times  ;  it  was  read  in 
every  family,  in  every  group,  in  every  assembly,  and  in  the  legislatures  and 
conventions  of  all  the  Colonies.  In  fact,  it  formed  the  chief  subject  of  con- 
versation and  debate  for  many  months  together.3 

In  his  '  Rights  of  Man,'  Part  Second,  adverting  to  the  beginning  of  his 
Revolutionary  labors  in  America,  Paine  says  :  '  I  saw  an  opportunity  in  which 
I  thought  I  could  do  some  good,  and  I  followed  exactly  what  my  heart  dic- 
tated. I  neither  read  books,  nor  studied  other  people's  opinions.'  A  more  pre- 
judiced or  ill-tempered  biography  could  hardly  be  written  than  Cheetham's 


1  It  reminds  us  of  what  Abraham  Lincoln  said  about  New  York,  March  22.  'A  pamphlet  entitled 
the  hero  of  Vicksburg,  when  somebody  told  him  he  "Common  Sense"  has  converted  thousands  to  Indepen- 
drank  hard  ;  '  Won't  you  then,  my  dear  fellow,'  said  dence  that  could  not  endure  the  idea  before.' — Almon's 
he,  '  tell  me  what  brand  he  uses,  and  I  will  order  a  sup-  Remembrancer,  vol.  iii.,  page  87.  It  is  stated  in  the 
ply  for  every  general  in  the  army.'  '  New  York  Gazette,'  April    8,    that    '  the  subject  of 

2  After  a  fruitless  search  for  a  printed  copy  of  a  conversation  throughout  America  for  these  few  weeks 
grand  oration  on  the  4th  July,  1832,  at  Hartford,  by  past  hath  been  excited  by  a  pamphlet  called  "Common 
Mr.  Gillett,  I  throw  myseif  on   my  recollection   for  one  Sense."' 

scathing  passage  on  the  curse  of  rum.      '  Neither  were  A  Philadelphia  letter  of  March  12,  says  :    '  "  Com- 

the  dauntless   sons  of  Carthage,  under  its  fitful  excite-  mon  Sense  "  is  read  to  all  ranks  ;  and  as  many  as  read, 

ment  when  they  followed  the  consummate  Hannibal  over  so  many  become  converted  ;   though  perhaps  the  hour 

the  Alps,  routed  the  enemy  on  the  field  of  Cannae,  and  before   were   most  violent  against    the   least   idea  ol 

carried  consternation  to  the  gates  of  the  seven-hilled  city.'  independence.' — Almon's  Remembrancer,    vol.    iii.,  p. 

*  In  his  Rise  of  the  Republic,  Mr.  Frothingham  31. 
cites  the  following  extracts  from  the  newspapers  of  the  The  '  Pennsylvania  Evening  Post'  of  Feb.  13,  1776, 
period: — 'New  England  Chronicle'  of  March  28th,  contains  a  letter  from  Maryland,  dated  Feb.  6,  which 
1776,  copies  the  appendix  to  'Common  Sense,'  writ-  says:  'If you  know  the  author  of  " Common  Sense," 
ten  by  Paine,  with  the  following  remarks  :  '  The  pub-  tell  him  he  has  done  wonders  and  worked  miracles, 
lie  in  general  having  read,  and  (excepting  a  few  timid  made  Tories  Whigs,  and  made  blackamores  white.  He 
Whigs  and  disguised  Tories),  loudly  applauded  that  has  made  a  great  number  of  converts  here.'  The  same 
'truly  excellent  pamphlet  entitled  "Common  Sense,"  our  paper,  March  26,  contains  a  letter,  dated  Charleston, 
readers  will  doubtless  be  pierced  with  the  following  Feb.  14,  which  says  :  '  Who  is  the  author  of  "  Common 
appendix,'  etc.  The  Boston  Gazette.  April  29,  1776,  Sense  "  ?  I  cannot  refrain  from  adoring  him.  He  de- 
has  the  following  :  '  Had  the  spirit  of  prophecy  directed  serves  a  statue  of  gold.'  A  letter  dated  Georgetown, 
the  birth  of  a  publication,  it  could  not  have  fallen  upon  South  Carolina.  March  17,  1776,  says:  "Common 
a  more  fortunate  period  than  the  time  in  which  "Com-  Sense'  bath  made  independents  of  the  majority  of  the 
mon  Sense"  made  its  appearance.  The  minds  of  men  country,  and  Gadsden  is  as  mad  with  it  as  he  ever  was 
are  now  swallowed  up  in  attention  to  an  object  the  most  without  it. — Proceedings  of  Massachusetts  Historical 
momentous  and  important  that  ever  yet  employed  the  Society,  1869,  1870,  254. — Frothingh*m's  Rise  0/  tk4 
deliberations  of  a  people.'  Republic,  pp.  479-480.                                                        1 


282  INFLUENCE  OF  THE  CRISIS  ON  THE  ARMY. 

*  Life  of  Paine.' p  But  there  is  something  sweet  in  praise  from  such  a  quarter, 
for  it  is  flavored  with  the  odor  which  emanates  from  the  extortion  of  justice. 
The  Crisis,  Paine's  next  work,  soon  began  to  come  out  in  numbers.  Of  the 
effect  of  the  first,  Cheetham  says  : — 'Paine  now  accompanied  the  army  of 
independence  as  a  sort  of  itinerant  writer,  of  which  his  pen  was  an  append- 
age almost  as  necessary  and  formidable  as  its  cannon.  Having  no  property, 
he  fared  as  the  army  fared,  and  at  the  same  expense ;  but  to  what  mess  he 
was  attached  I  have  not  been  able  to  learn,  although  from  what  I  hear  and 
know,  it  must,  I  think,  though  he  was  sometimes  admitted  into  higher  com- 
pany, have  been  a  subaltern  one.  When  the  colonists  drooped  he  revived 
them  with  a  Crisis.'  The  first  of  these  numbers  he  published  early  in  Decem- 
ber, 1776.  The  object  of  it  was  good,  the  method  excellent,  and  the  lan- 
guage suited  to  the  depressed  spirits  of  the  army,  of  public  bodies,  and  to 
private  citizens,  cheering.  Washington  defeated  on  Long  Island,  had  retreat- 
ed to  New  York,  and  been  driven  with  great  loss  from  Forts  Washington  and 
Lee.  The  gallant  little  army,  overwhelmed  with  a  rapid  succession  of  misfor- 
tunes, was  dwindling  away,  and  all  seemed  to  be  over  with  the  cause,  when 
scarcely  a  blow  had  been  struck.  '  These,'  said  the  Crisis,  '  are  the  times  that 
try  men's  souls.  The  summer  soldier  and  the  sunshine  patriot  will  in  this 
crisis,  shrink  from  the  service  of  his  country ;  but  he  that  stands  it  now  de- 
serves the  love  and  thanks  of  man  and  woman.  Tyranny,  like  hell,  is  not 
easily  conquered ;  yet  we  have  this  consolation  with  us,  that  the  harder  the 
conflict,  the  more  glorious  the  triumph;  what  we  obtain  too  cheap,  we  es- 
teem too  lightly  ! ' 

'  The  number  was  read  in  the  camp  to  every  corporal's  guard,  and  in  the 
army  and  out  of  it,  had  more  than  the  intended  effect.  The  Convention 
of  New  York,  reduced  by  dispersion  occasioned  by  alarm,  to  nine  members, 
was  rallied  and  reanimated.  Militiamen  who,  already  tired  of  the  war,  were 
straggling  from  the  army,  returned.  Hope  succeeded  despair,  cheerfulness 
to  gloom,  and  firmness  to  irresolution.  To  the  confidence  which  it  inspired, 
may  be  attributed  much  of  the  brilliant  little  affair  which  in  the  same 
month  followed  at  Trenton.' 2 

The  publication  of  the  serial  'Crisis'  continued  until  April  19th,  1783, 
when  peace  had  been  substantially  concluded.  During  this  long  period,  the 
seventeen  numbers  had  been  issued,  each  adapted  to  the  exigency  as  it  arose, 

1  Cheetham  had  been  an  enthusiastic  admirer  and  the  dying,  but  the  dead  lion,  by  writing  the  life  of  his 

disciple  of  Paine,  and  a  noisy  advocate  of  his  political  adversary.     Cheetham,  however,  connected  this  with  a 

and  religious  opinions.     Vale,  who  subsequently  wrote  scheme  of  interest ;  for  becoming  the  deadly  enemy  of 

a  fairer  life  of  Paine,  overthrows  many  of  his  statements,  democracy,  and  losing  the  support  of  his  old  friends  (for 


showing  that  he  became  the  libeller  of  the  author  of     he  was  turned  out  of  the  Tammany  Society),  he  was  pre- 
paring to  go  to  Europe,  and  enlis 
of  Republicanism,   and  had  sold   himself  out   to   the    Tory  government  in  England,  by  publishing  a  paper  op- 


Common  Sense,  only  after  he  had  deserted  the  cause    paring  to  go  to  Europe,  and  enlist  in  support  of  the 


British  party.  posed  to  Cobbett,  who  had  just  come  out  in  opposition 

'  Immediately  after  the  death  of  Paine,  Cheetham  to  the  government ;  and  Cheetham  apparently  meant 

wrote  his  life  in  1809.     Cheetham  was  an  Englishman,  this  life  of  Paine  as  a  passport  to  the  British  treasury 

and  had  been  a  zealous  disciple  of  Paine,  both  in  poli-  favor  :    at  least,  such  was  the  opinion  of  the  intimate 

tics  and  religion  ;  but  he  had   retrograded  in  politics,  friend  of  Cheetham,  Mr.  Charles  Christian,  who  gave 

and  deserted  the  principles  of  the  democratic  party  ;  this  relation  to  Mr.  John  Fellows  and  others,  whom  we 

Paine  had  attacked  him  with  his  accustomed  force,  and  have  seen,  and  from  whom  we  have  learned  this  fact, 

thus  converted  him  into  a  personal  enemy.    Mr.  Cheet-  This  life  of  Paine,  the  only  one  published  in  the  United 

ham  \t  this  time  edited  a  party  paper  (the  Citizen)  in  States,    abounds    in    calumnies.'  —  Vale's    Life   oj 

New  Vork,  and  while  he  was  yet  smarting  under  the  Thomas  Paine,  p.  4. 

lash  of  Paine,  heated  by  party  politics,  and  fired  with  a  Cheetham's  Life  of  Paine,  pp.  55-56. 

revenge,  like  the  ass  in  the  fable,  he  kicked,  not  indeed 


NATIONAL  GRATITUDE  TO  PAINE.  283 

and  each  producing  the  effect  designed — some  with  less,  others  with  greater 
power.  Of  this  performance  Cheetham  remarks  :  '  He,  who,  if  not  the  sug 
gester,  was  the  ablest  literary  advocate  of  independence,  could  do  no  less, 
when  independence  was  acquired,  than  salute  the  nation  on  the  great  event. 
He  is  not,  however,  content  with  proudly  reflecting  on  past,  and  triumphantly 
revelling  in  present  circumstances.  He  still  looks  forward,  still  suggests,  still 
advises.  He  points  to  the  formation  of  a  national  character — that  broad  and 
solid  foundation  of  national  safety,  happiness,  greatness  and  glory — and  sternly 
recommends  an  union  of  the  States.1 

At  the  close  of  the  war,  Washington  proposed  to  Congress  to  make  some 
permanent  provision  for-  Paine ;  for  in  addition  to  his  great  services  as  a 
writer,  he  had  for  nearly  two  years  acted  as  Secretary  to  the  Committee  of 
Foreign  Affairs,  and  been  influential  in  assisting  Laurens,  who  had  been  sent 
on  a  mission  to  France,  to  obtain  a  loan  in  178 1.  'It  would  be  pleasing  to 
me,'  said  Washington  to  a  member  of  the  Congress,  *  and  perhaps  obviate 
charges  of  ingratitude,  if  Congress  should  place  him  in  a  state  of  ease.  I 
have  offered  Paine  a  seat  at  my  own  table,  but  he  would  doubtless  prefer 
something  more  independent.'  '  The  following  resolution  was  ultimately 
passed  : — '  Resolved,  That  the  early,  unsolicited,  and  continued  labors  of  Mr. 
Thomas  Paine,  in  explaining  and  enforcing  the  principles  of  the  late  Revolu- 
tion, by  ingenious  and  timely  publications  upon  the  nature  of  liberty  and  civil 
government,  have  been  well  received  by  the  citizens  of  these  States,  and 
merit  the  approbation  of  Congress ;  and  that  in  consideration  of  these  ser- 
vices and  the  benefits  produced  thereby,  Mr.  Paine  is  entitled  to  a  liberal 
gratification  from  the  United  States.'  The  sum  of  three  thousand  dollars  was 
thus  presented  to  him.  The  Legislature  of  Pennsylvania  voted  him  five 
hundred  pounds.  But  New  York,  in  a  more  munificent  spirit,  gave  him  the 
confiscated  estate  of  Frederick  Davoe,  an  obnoxious  Tory.  This  beautiful 
estate  of  upwards  of  three  hundred  acres,  in  high  cultivation,  with  a  fine, 
spacious,  stone  mansion  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  feet  in  length,  and  corre- 
sponding outbuildings,  lying  at  New  Rochelle,  in  the  County  of  Westchester, 
was  a  fitting  home  for  the  greatest  of  all  democratic  writers. 

1  Washington's  Invitation  to  Paine.  '  Your  presence  may  remind  Congress  of  your  past 

'  Rocky  Hill,  Sept.  10,  1783.  services  to  this  country  ;  and  if  it  is  in  my  power  to  mv 

'  I  have  learned,  since  I  have  been  at  this  place,  that  press  them,  command  my  best  exertions  with  freedom, 
you  are  at  Bordentown.  Whether  for  the  sake  of  retire-  as  they  will  be  rendered  cheerfully  by  one  who  enter- 
ment,  or  economy,  I  know  not.  Be  it  for  either,  for  both,  tains  a  lively  sense  of  the  importance  of  your  works,  and 
or  whatever  it  may.  if  you  will  come  to  this  place  and  who,  with  much  pleasure,  subscribes  himself,  Your  sin- 
partake  with  me,  I  shall  be  exceedingly  happy  to  see  cere  friend,  G.  Washington.'— Vale's  Life  of  Thos. 
you  at  it  Paine,  p,  70. 


284  CONSOLIDA  TION  AND  STA  TESMANSHIP. 


SECOND     PERIOD. 
1776— 1815. 

CONSOLIDATION  AND  STATESMANSHIP. 

FROM    THE    DECLARATION     OF    INDEPENDENCE,    TO     THE 
CLOSE  OF   THE   SECOND   WAR  WITH    ENGLAND. 


SECTION    FIRST. 

DECLARATION    OF    INDEPENDENCE. 

The  hour  had  at  last  come  for  the  final  step  to  be  taken,  which  was  to 
rend  forever  the  Thirteen  Colonies  from  the  throne  of  Great  Britain.  Scarcely 
three  months  had  passed  since  the  English  troops  had  been  driven  out  of 
Boston,  and  the  shadow  of  great  war  was  spreading  over  the  whole  country. 
Nearly  every  provincial  Assembly  had  spoken  in  favor  of  Independence. 
But  still  the  Colonial  Congress  hesitated  on  the  verge  of  the  abyss  which  a 
single  act  would  lay  open  at  their  feet,  while  the  nation  itself  seemed  ready  for 
the  last  decisive  movement. 

For  many  days  a  feeling  of  dread  had  been  coming  over  the  minds  of  the 
delegates.  A  murky  gloom  pervaded  the  Hall  where  their  deliberations  were 
held.  Richard  Henry  Lee  had  already  displayed  the  high  qualities  of  a  states- 
man, and  his  soul  glowed  with  patriotic  fervor.  He  rose  in  his  place,  and  in 
the  rich  tones  which  gave  so  magical  a  charm  to  his  eloquence,  read  in  a 
clear  deliberate  voice,  the  great  Resolution  which  so  far  transcended  the  ac- 
tion of  Congress  on  the  10th  of  May,  recommending  the  establishment  of 
independent  State  governments  in  all  the  Colonies,  that  it  was  rather  the  ex* 
pression  of  the  popular  will  of  the  country — could  it  have  been  heard  that 
day — than  the  will  of  Congress  itself.  It  embraced  the  three  great  subjects 
— a  Declaration  of  Independence,  a  Confederation  of  the  States,  and  Treaties 
with  Foreign  Powers — and  was  in  the  following  words  :— *  That  the  United  Col- 
onies are,' and  of  right  ought  to  be  free  and  independent  States  ;  that  they  are 
absolved  from  all  allegiance  to  the  British  Crown,  and  that  all  political  con- 
nection between  them  and  Great  Britain  is,  and  ought  to  be  totally  dissolved. 

'  That  it  is  expedient  forthwith  to  take  the  most  effectual  measures  for 
forming  foreign  alliances. 


THOMAS    JEPFEaSOIf. 


RESOLUTION  OF  INDEPENDENCE  IN  CONGRESS.  285 

*  That  the  plan  of  Confederation  be  prepared  and  transmitted  to  the  re 
spective  Colonies,  for  their  consideration  and  approbation.' 

Mr.  Lee's  biographer,  says  tradition  relates  that  he  prefaced  his  mo- 
tion with  a  speech,  portraying  the  resources  of  the  Colonies,  and  their  capacity 
for  defence,  dwelling  especially  on  the  bearing  which  an  independent  position 
might  have  on  foreign  powers,  and  concluded  by  urging  the  members  so  to 
act,  that  the  day  might  give  birth  to  an  American  Republic. 

It  was  known  that  Mr.  Lee  was  to  introduce  the  great  Resolution,  and 
it  was  equally  well  known  that,  if  pressed  at  the  time,  it  would  divide  the 
House.  Only  a  few  of  the  more  dauntless  spirits,  even  in  that  brave  Assembly, 
were  prepared  for  so  irrevocable  a  Declaration.  The  question  was  brought 
home  to  every  delegate.  Every  man  there  knew  that  in  voting  for  it,  he  was 
deliberately  putting  the  halter  round  his  own  neck.  One  movement  further, 
and  he  had  leaped  the  gulf,  and  found  himself  beyond  the  line  of  high  treason 
— a  proclaimed  outlaw,  with  a  price  on  his  head.  Any  man  might  kill  him — 
the  God  of  Heaven  alone  having  the  power  to  put  a  mark  upon  his  brow  that 
would  exempt  him  from  slaughter. 

John  Adams  seconded  Lee's  motion  ;  but  we  learn  from  the  Journal  of 
Congress,  that  the  Resolution  was  postponed  till  the  next  morning,  and 
the  members  were  enjoined  to  attend  punctually  at  10  o'clock,  in  order  to 
take  the  same  into  consideration. 

Promptly  at  the  hour,  the  House  met,  when  Lee's  Resolution  was  refer- 
red to  a  committee  of  the  whole.  Benjamin  Harrison,  the  future  Governor 
of  Virginia,  took  the  chair.  Then  commenced  that  great  debate  of  which 
we  know  so  little,  except  the  result.  It  lasted  till  seven  o'clock  in  the 
evening,  when  Hancock  resumed  the  chair  and  announced,  that  as  the  com- 
mittee had  come  to  no  decision,  they  had  directed  him  to  ask  leave  to  sit 
again  on  Monday,  June  10th,  and  the  motion  to  adjourn  over  Sunday  was 
carried. 

For  two  days  longer,  the  Resolution  was  debated  with  all  the  vehemence 
and  power  which  could  be  brought  for  its  defence  on  the  one  side,  against 
everything  that  could  be  said  on  the  other.  The  page  of  no  history  yet  written, 
or  that  ever  can  be  written,  will  give  more  than  a  faint  idea  of  this  gigantic 
and  desperate  struggle ;  for  it  is  not  known,  after  a  careful  search  of  a  cen- 
tury, that  a  single  speech  then  delivered  is  now  in  existence.1  In  the  Pre- 
face of  the  Memoir,  Correspondence  and  Miscellanies  from  the  Papers  of 
Thomas  Jefferson,  it  is  declared,  that  this  is  the  first  disclosure  to  the  world 
of  these  debates.  We  are  told  at  the  time  Jefferson  summed  up  the  argu- 
ments for  and  against  the  Resolution  urged  by  the  speakers  during  both  days — 1 
that  on  the  one  side,  James  Wilson,  Robert  R.  Livingston,  Edward  Rutledge» 
John  Dickinson,  declared  themselves  in  favor  of  the  measures,  but  objected 
to  their  adoption  at  the  time  because  there  would  be  a  lack  of  unanimity  ; 
and  pleading  for  a  delay  of  three  weeks,  they  announced  that  by  that  time, 

1  The  elaborate  speech  of  John  Dickinson,  of  before  the  Congress  for  discussion  on  its  final  pas- 
Pennsylvania,  in  favor  of  delaying  the  Declaration,  sage,  he  preserved  and  caused  it  afterwards  to  be 
delivered  three  weeks  later,  when    that  measure  was     published. 


286  COMMITTEE  TO  DRAW  THE  DECLARATION. 

they  believed  the  Middle  Colonies,  which  were  not  then  ripe  for  the  measure* 
would  be  prepared  for  it.  They  were  answered  with  irresistible  logic  by 
John  Adams,  Richard  Henry  Lee,  and  George  Wythe,  who  were  the  most 
powerful  orators  in  the  body.  John  Adams  defended  the  measure  as  having 
in  view  *  objects  of  the  most  stupendous  magnitude,  in  which  the  lives  and 
liberties  of  millions  yet  unborn  were  intimately  interested.' 

Congress  sat  with  closed  doors,  and  when  they  were  thrown  open  at  the 
close  of  each  sitting,  and  that  band  of  men  came  forth,  eye-witnesses  described 
the  scene  as  one  of  the  most  imposing  solemnity.  They  walked  to  their 
lodgings,  some  of  them  with  bowed  heads,  but  others  with  the  steadiness  of 
firmly  strung  nerves  indicating  the  fearful  earnestness  of  their  determination. 
The  latter  class  grew  more  numerous  day  by  day.  Far  into  the  night  hours 
they  assembled  in  knots  in  each  other's  dwellings,  when  old  and  worn-out 
arguments  were  once  more  brought  up  to  be  shivered  by  the  fiery  blows  of 
John  Adams,  or  dissolved  by  the  irresistible  charm  of  Lee's  persuasion.  But 
the  ice  was  melting  from  the  foot  of  the  glacier,  and  on  the  fourth  day  from 
the  time  Lee's  Resolution  was  read,  the  great  Committee  whose  names  were 
forever  to  be  associated  with  the  grandest  act  this  continent  has  witnessed, 
was  appointed  :  Thomas  Jefferson,  of  Virginia,  John  Adams,  of  Massachusetts, 
Benjamin  Franklin,  of  Pennsylvania,  Roger  Sherman,  of  Connecticut,  and 
Robert  R.  Livingston,  of  New  York.  They  were  instructed  to  draw  up  a 
Declaration  in  the  spirit  of  Lee's  Resolution  which  was  still  before  the  House, 
and  bring  in  their  report  at  a  future  day,  whenever  that  Resolution  should 
be  brought  up.  Had  not  the  framer  of  the  Resolution  been  summoned,  to 
what  he  feared  was  the  dying-bed  of  his  wife,  he  would  have  been  appointed 
chairman  of  the  Committee,  and  become  the  author  of  the  Declaration.  But 
fortune  had  reserved  that  glory  for  Thomas  Jefferson,  on  whom  the  choice  by 
common  consent  fell. 

Jefferson  thus  sums  up  the  result : — 'It  appearing  in  the  course  of  these 
debates,  that  the  Colonies  of  New  York,  New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  Dela- 
ware, Maryland  and  South  Carolina  were  not  yet  matured  for  falling  from 
the  parent  stem,  but  that  they  were  fast  advancing  to  that  state,  it  was  thought 
prudent  to  wait  a  while  for  them.' 

To  secure  unanimity,  a  postponement  of  the  Resolution  of  Independence 
was  agreed  to  till  the  first  day  of  July.  Two  days  later,  June  12  th,  a  Com- 
mittee of  one  delegate  from  each  Colony  was  appointed  to  report  the  form 
of  a  Confederation,  and  another  Committee  of  five  delegates,  was  chosen  to 
prepare  a  Plan  of  Treaties  to  be  proposed  to  Foreign  Powers.1 

1  On  the  preceding  Sunday,  June  9th,  John  Adams  Hn  will  he  Governor  of  Pennsylvania.  The  new  mem- 
wrote  to  his  wife  : — '  How  many  calamities  might  have  bers  of  this  city  are  all  in  this  taste,  chosen  because  of 
been  avoided  if  these  measures  had  been  taken  twelve  their  inflexible  zeal  for  independence.  All  the  old  mem- 
months  ago,  or  even  no  longer  ago  than  last  Decern-  bers  left  out,  because  they  opposed  independence,  or  at 
ber,'  and  further  :  — '  In  the  choice  of  their  rulers,  least  were  lukewarm  about  it  : — Dickinson,  Morris, 
capacity,  spirit,  zeal  in  the  cause  supply  the  place  of  Allen,  all  fallen  like  grass  before  the  scythe,  notwith- 
fortune,  family,  and  every  other  consideration  which  standing  all  their  vast  advantages  in  point  of  fortune, 
used  to  have  weight  with  mankind.  My  friend  Archi-  family,  and  abilities.  lam  inclined  to  think,  however, 
bald  Bullock,  Esq..  is  Governor  of  Georgia  ;  John  and  to  wish  that  these  gentlemen  may  be  restore'  at  a 
Rutledge,  Esq.,  is  Governor  of  Virginia  ;  Dr.  Frank-  fresh  election,   because,  although    mistaken   in    some 


MORNING  OF  THE  FOURTH  OF  JULY,  1776.  287 

The  Three  Weeks  of  Suspense  Preceding  the  Declaration. — The  history  of 
those  three  weeks  while  the  nation  was  waiting  for  that  fourth  of  July  to 
come,  witnessed  clouds  of  peril  and  disaster  closing  around  thicker  than  ever. 
From  the  North,  news  came  that  the  fragments  of  the  Arnold  and  Montgomery 
expeditions  were  being  driven  out  of  Canada.  Admiral  Howe  with  his  fleet, 
and  General  Howe  with  his  army,  composed  of  regulars,  Hessians,  Han- 
overians, Tories  and  Indians,  were  '  plundering  and  murdering,  while  the 
king  was  amusing  a  distressed  people  with  the  sound  of  Commissioners  cry- 
ing peace  when  there  was  no  peace.'  ■ 

Loyalists  were  arming  all  through  Delaware,  New  Jersey,  and  New  York. 
4  Anxiety  and  apprehension  invaded  every  breast.  Every  popular  assembly, 
every  religious  congregation,  every  scene  of  social  intercourse,  or  of  domestic 
privacy  and  retirement,  was  a  scene  of  deliberation  on  the  public  calamity 
and  the  impending  danger.'  a 

The  Commander-in-Chief  was  without  money,  or  sufficient  military  sup- 
plies. The  Colonies  were  in  political  chaos ;  and  to  give  any  conception  to 
men  now  living,  of  the  awful  suspense  that  hung  over  the  nation  during  those 
long  three  weeks  which  intervened  between  the  appointment  of  the  Committee 
to  draft  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  its  final  adoption,  is  an  utter 
impossibility.  But  twelve  of  the  United  Colonies — as  they  now  called  them- 
selves— had  authorized  their  representatives  to  unite  in  making  the  Declara- 
tion, for  as  Judge  Drayton  said  from  the  bench  of  Charleston,  in  a  charge 
the  15th  of  the  following  October  :  'Such  a  declaration  was  of  right  to  be 
made  only  by  the  General  Congress,  because  the  united  voice  and  strength  of 
America  were  necessary  to  give  a  desirable  credit  and  prospect  of  stability 
to  a  declared  state  of  total  separation  from  Great  Britain.  A  decree  has  now 
gone  forth,  not  to  be  recalled  ;  and  thus  has  suddenly  risen  in  the  world,  a 
new  empire,  styled  the  United  States  of  America.' 8 

The  Morning  of  the  Fourth  of  July,  1776. — It  broke  in  all  the  splendor 
of  midsummer,  and  the  day  closed  more  gloriously,  for  at  sunset  the  great 
bell  on  the  Hall  of  Independence  was  to  ring  out  its  peals  as  gladly  as  if 
hailing  a  festival  of  victory,  instead  of  proclaiming  a  crusade  of  struggle  and 
blood.  And  well  it  might,  for  the  day  was  full  of  the  inspirations  of  hope  ; 
its  founders  had  cast  on  the  bell  itself  an  inscription  which  bade  it  <  Proclaim 
Liberty  throughout  the  Land  unto  all  the  inhabitants  thereof:  4  The  Congress 
had  met  at  ten  o'clock,  and  after  the  usual  preliminaries,  proceeded  to  the 
order  of  the  day. 

points,  they  are  good  characters,  and  their  great  wealth  *  American  Remembrancer,  vol.  v.,  p.  327. 

and  numerous  connections  will  contribute  to  strengthen  4  When    the    debates  were  ended,  and  the    result 

America  and  cement  her  union.'      In  another  letter  of  was   announced,  on    the   4th  of  July,   1776,  the  iron 

the  day  after,  printed  in  the  '  Life  and  Works  of  John  tongue   of  that    very    bell  first    '  proclaimed    liberty 

Adams,'  vol.  ix.,    page    391,  he   says  :—' Objects    of  throughout  all  the  land,  unto  all  the  inhabitants  there- 

the  most  stupendous  magnitude  and  measures  in  which  of,'  by  ringing  out  the  joyful   annunciation,  for  more 

the  lives  and  fortunes  of  the   millions  yet  unborn  are  than  two  hours,  its  glorious  melody  floating  clear  and 

intimately  connected,  are  now  before  us.    We  are  in  the  musical  as  the  voice  of  an  angel  above  the  discordant 

midst  of  a  revolution,  the  most  complete,  unexpected  chorus  of  booming  cannon,  the  roll  of  drums,  and.  the 

and  remarkable  of  any  in  the  history  of  nations.'  mingled  acclamations  of  the  people.— Lossing's  Ft  eld- 

1   Co*m.   Courant,  June  17,   1776.  Book  0/ the  Revolution,  vol.  11.,  pp.  66-67. 

8  Tucker's  Blacks  tone,  vol.  i.,  part  I,  p.  84. 


288  FINAL  SPEECH  OF  JOHN  ADAMS. 

Some  new  members  of  Congress  were  present  for  the  first  time ;  among 
them  Richard  Stockton,  of  New  Jersey,  who  was  so  importunate  in  his  de- 
mand for  the  question  to  be  further  discussed,  that  the  House  exclaimed,  '  Let 
the  gentleman  be  gratified,'  and  now  we  have  a  gleam  of  light  on  those  pro- 
ceedings. In  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Mercy  Warren,  dated  Quincy,  1807,  published  by 
Frothingham  in  his  '  Rise  of  the  Republic,'  for  the  first  time,  Mr.  Adams 
says: — "All  was  silence;  no  one  would  speak;  all  eyes  were  turned  upon 
me  :  Mr.  Edward  Rutledge  came  to  me  and  said  laughing  : — '  Nobody  will 
speak  but  you  upon  this  subject ;  you  have  all  the  topics  so  ready,  you  must 
satisfy  the  gentleman  from  New  Jersey.'  "  He  further  adds  that :  "  Somewhat 
confused  at  this  personal  appeal,  I  rose  and  began.  This  is  the  first 
time  in  my  life,  when  I  seriously  wished  for  the  genius  and  eloquence  of  the 
celebrated  orators  of  Athens  and  Rome,  called  in  this  unexpected  and  unpre- 
pared manner  to  exhibit  all  the  arguments  in  favor  of  a  measure,  the  most 
important  in  my  judgment  that  had  ever  been  discussed  in  civil  or  political 
society.  I  had  no  art  or  oratory  to  exhibit,  and  could  produce  nothing  but 
simple  reason  and  plain  common  sense.  I  felt  myself  oppressed  by  the 
weight  of  the  subject ;  and  I  believe  if  Demosthenes  or  Cicero  had  ever  been 
called  to  deliberate  on  so  great  a  question,  neither  would  have  relied  on  his 
own  talents  without  a  supplication  to  Minerva,  and  a  sacrifice  to  Mercury,  or 
the  god  of  Eloquence."  Mr.  Adams  adds,  that  when  the  Abbe  Raynal  after- 
wards requested  him  to  furnish  him  with  any  speeches  he  had  published  or 
delivered,  he  assured  the  Abbe  that  he  had  never  published  or  written  a 
speech  in  his  life  made  in  any  public  assembly.  That  he  did  not  wish  that 
any  one  he  had  ever  delivered  should  be  preserved  in  form,  excepting  the  one 
made  upon  the  question  of  Independence  ;  but  of  even  that  speech  he  had 
no  minutes  himself  of  what  he  said,  and  that  no  part  of  it  had  ever  been 
published.1 

1  In  a  letter  of  Daniel  Webster,  to  be  found  in  Cur-  blinded  to  her  own  interest,  for  our  good  she  has  ob- 
tis'  Life,  vol.  ii.,  page  295,  dated  Jan.  27,  1846,  the  stinately  persisted,  till  independence  is  now  within  our 
great  statesman  says  :  *  So  far  as  I  know  there  is  not  grasp.  We  have  but  to  reach  forth  to  it,  and  it  is  ours, 
existing  in  print  or  manuscript,  the  speech  or  any  part  Why,  then,  should  we  defer  the  Declaration  ?  Is  any 
or  fragment  of  a  speech,  delivered  by  Mr.  Adams,  on  man  so  weak  as  now  to  hope  for  a  reconciliation  with 
the  Declaration  of  Independence.'  True,  the  contrary  England,  which  shall  leave  either  safety  to  the  country 
impression  is  quite  prevalent,  and  most  young  gentle-  and  its  liberties,  or  safety  to  his  own  life  and  his  own 
men  suppose,  that  when  they  are  declaiming  the  elo-  honor?  Are  not  you,  sir,  who  sit  in  that  chair,  is  not  he  our 
quent  words  of  Daniel  Webster,  in  his  discourse  at  venerable  colleague  near  you,  are  you  not  both  already 
Eaneuil  Hall,  on  the  second  of  August,  1826,  in  com-  the  proscribed  and  predestined  objects  of  punishment, 
memoration  of  the  life  and  services  of  John  Adams  and  of  vengeance  ?  Cut  off  from  all  hope  of  royal  dem- 
and Thomas  Jefferson,  they  are  actually  uttering  the  ency,  what  are  you,  what  can  you  be,  while  the  power 
speech  which  John  Adams  delivered  when  he  was  of  England  remains,  but  outlaws  ?  If  we  postpone  in- 
pleading  for  the  adoption  of  the  Declaration.  But  Mr.  dependence,  do  we  mean  to  carry  on,  or  to  give  up  the 
Webster  premises  his  own  burning  words  by  saying  :  war  ?  Do  we  mean  to  submit  to  the  measures  of  Parlia- 
'  It  was  for  Mr.  Adams,  to  reply  to  arguments  like  ment,  Boston  Port  Bill,  and  all?  Do  we  mean  to  submit 
these.  We  know  his  opinions,  and  we  know  his  charac-  and  consent  that  we  ourselves  shall  be  ground  to  powder, 
ter  ;  he  would  commence  with  his  accustomed  directness  and  our  country  and  its  rights  trodden  down  in  the  dust  ? 
and  earnestness.  I  know  we  do  not  mean  to  submit.  We  never  shall  sub- 

'  Sink  or  swim,  live  or  die,  survive  or  perish,  I  give  mit.  Do  we  intend  to  violate  that  most  solemn  obligation 

my  hand  and  my  heart  to  this  vote.    It  is  true,  indeed,  ever  entered  into  by  men,  that  plighting  before  God, 

that  in  the  beginning  we  aimed  not  at  independence,  of  our  sacred  honor  to  Washington,  when  putting  him 

But   there's  a  Divinity  which  shapes  our  ends.     The  forth  to  incur  the  dangers  of  war,  as  well  as  the  politi- 

injustice  of   England  has  driven   us   to    arms  ;    and  cal  hazards  of  the  tunes,  we  promised  to  adhere  to  him 


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FINAL  ADOPTION  OF  THE  DECLARATION. 


289 


Jefferson  had  been  requested  to  prepare  the  first  draft,  and  when  he  pre- 
sented it  to  Adams  and  Franklin,  it  was  his  own  work :  neither  the  order  nol 
the  substance  of  it  was  impaired  by  the  few  alterations  they  made.1 


Final  Adoption  of  the  Declaration. — The  question  before  the  House  was 
on  the  adoption  of  the  paper  which  lay  upon  the  table,  with  the  alterations, 
and  finally,  as  the  sun  was  about  setting,  and  the  question,  \  Shall  the  Decla- 


in  every  extremity,  with  our  fortunes  and  our  lives  ?  I 
know  there  is  not  a  man  here  who  would  not  rather  see 
a  general  conflagration  sweep  over  the  land,  or  an  earth- 
quake sink  it,  than  one  jot  or  tittle  of  that  plighted 
faith  fall  to  the  ground.  For  myself,  having  twelve 
months  ago,  in  this  place,  moved  you,  that  George  Wash- 
ington be  appointed  commander  of  the  forces  raised 
or  to  be  raised  for  defence  of  American  liberty,  may 
my  right  hand  forget  her  cunning,  and  my  tongue 
cleave  to  the  roof  of  my  mouth,  if  I  hesitate  or  waver 
in  the  support  I  give  him. 

1  The  war,  then,  must  go  on.  We  must  fight  it 
through.  And  if  the  war  must  go  on,  why  put  off 
longer  the  Declaration  of  Independence  ?  That  meas- 
ure will  strengthen  us.  It  will  give  us  character 
abroad.  The  nations  will  then  treat  with  us,  which 
they  never  can  do  while  we  acknowledge  ourselves  sub- 
jects in  arms  against  our  sovereign.  Nay,  I  maintain 
that  England  herself  will  sooner  treat  for  peace  with 
us  on  the  footing  of  independence  than  consent,  by  re- 
pealing her  acts,  to  acknowledge  that  her  whole  con- 
duct towards  us  has  been  a  course  of  injustice  and 
oppression.  Her  pride  will  be  less  wounded  by  sub- 
mitting to  that  course  of  things  which  now  predesti- 
nates our  independence,  than  by  yielding  the  points  in 
controversy  to  her  rebellious  subjects.  The  former  she 
would  regard  as  the  result  of  fortune  ;  the  latter  she 
would  feel  as  her  own  deep  disgrace.  Why,  then, 
why,  then,  sir,  do  we  not  as  soon  as  possible  change 
this  from  a  civil  to  a  National  War?  And  since  we 
must  fight  it  through,  why  not  put  ourselves  in  a  state 
to  enjoy  all  the  benefits  of  victory,  if  we  gain  the 
victory. 

'  If  we  fail  it  can  be  no  worse  for  us.  But  we  shall  not 
fail.  The  cause  will  raise  up  armies  ;  the  cause  will  create 
navies.  The  people,  the  people,  if  we  are  true  to  them 
will  carry  us,  and  will  carry  themselves  gloriously 
through  this  struggle.  I  care  not  how  fickle  other 
people  have  been  found,  I  know  the  people  of  these 
Colonies,  and  I  know  that  resistance  to  British  aggres- 
sion is  deep  and  settled  in  their  hearts  and  cannot  be 
eradicated.  Every  Colony,  indeed,  has  expressed  its, 
willingness  to  follow,  if  we  but  take  the  lead.  Sir,  the 
Declaration  will  inspire  the  people  with  increased  cour- 
age: Instead  of  a  long  and  bloody  war  for  the  restora- 
tion of  privileges,  for  redress  of  grievances,  fo* 
chartered  immunities  held  under  a  British  king,  set 
before  them  the  glorious  object  of  entire  independence, 
and  it  will  breathe  into  them  anew  the  breath  of  life. 
Read  this  Declaration  at  the  head  of  the  army  ;  every 
6word  will  be  drawn  from  its  scabbard,  and  the  solemn 
vow  uttered  to  maintain  it  or  to  perish  on  the  bed 
of  honor.  Publish  it  from  the  pulpit ;  religion  will  ap- 
prove it,  and  the  love  of  religious  liberty  will  cling 
round  it,  resolved  to  stand  with  it,  or  fall  "'ith  it.  Send 
19 


it  to  the  public  halls,  proclaim  it  there  ;  let  them  hear 
it  who  heard  the  first  roar  of  the  enemy's  cannon  ;  let 
them  see  it  who  saw  their  brothers  and  their  sons  fall 
on  the  field  of  Bunker  Hill,  and  in  the  streets  of  Lex- 
ington and  Concord,  and  the  very  walls  will  cry  out  in 
its  support. 

1  Sir,  I  know  the  uncertainty  of  human  affairs,  but 
I  see,  I  see  clearly  through  this  day's  business.  You 
and  I,  indeed,  may  rue  it.  We  may  not  liv«,  to  the  time 
when  this  Declaration  shall  be  made  good.  We  may  die ; 
die  colonists ;  die  slaves  ;  die,  it  may  be,  ignorainious- 
ly  and  on  the  scaffold.  Be  it  so,  be  it  so.  If  it  be 
the  pleasure  of  Heaven  that  my  country  shall  require 
the  poor  offering  of  my  life,  the  victim  shall  be  ready  at 
the  appointed  hour  of  sacrifice,  come  when  that  hour 
may.  But  while  I  do  live,  let  me  have  a  country,  or  at 
least  the  hope  of  a  country,  and  that  a  free  country. 

•  But  whatever  may  be  our  fate,  be  assured,  be  assur- 
ed that  this  Declaration  will  stand.  It  may  cost  treasure, 
and  it  may  cost  blood  ;  but  it  will  stand,  and  it  will 
richly  compensate  for  both.  Through  the  thick  gloom 
of  the  present  I  see  the  brightness  of  the  future  as  the 
sun  in  heaven.  We  shall  make  this  a  glorious,  an  im- 
mortal day.  When  we  are  in  our  graves,  our  children 
will  honor  it.  They  will  celebrate  it  with  thanksgiving, 
with  festivity,  with  bonfires  and  illuminations.  On  its 
annual  return  they  will  shed  tears,  copious,  gushing 
tears,  not  of  subjection  and  slavery,  not  of  agony  and 
distress,  but  of  exultation,  of  gratitude,  and  of  joy. 
Sir,  before  God,  I  believe  the  hour  is  come.  My 
judgment  approves  this  measure,  and  my  whole  heart 
is  in  it.  All  that  I  have,  and  all  that  I  am,  and  all 
that  I  hope  in  this  life,  I  am  now  ready  here  to  stake 
upon  it ;  and  I  leave  off  as  I  began,  that  live  or  die, 
survive  or  perish,  I  am  for  the  Declaration.  It  is  my  liv- 
ing sentiment,  and  by  the  blessing  of  God  it  shall  be 
my  dying  sentiment  :  Independence  now  and  Inde- 
pendence forever.' 

1  The  Declaration  having  been  reported  to  Con- 
gress by  the  committee,  the  resolution  itself  was  taken 
up  and  debated  on  the  first  day  of  July,  and  again  on 
the  second,  on  which  last  day  it  was  agreed  to  and 
adopted.  t  ' 

Having  thus  passed  the  main  Resolution,  Congress 
proceeded  to  consider  the  reported  draught  of  the  Dec- 
laration. It  was  discussed  on  the  secondhand  third, 
and  fourth  days  of  the  month  in  committee  of  the 
whole  ;  and  on  the  last  of  those  days,  being  reported 
from  that  committee,  it  received  the  final  approbation 
and  sanction  of  Congress.  It  was  ordered  at  the  same 
time  that  copies  be  sent  to  the  several  States,  and  that 
it  be  proclaimed  at  the  head  of  the  army.  The  Decla- 
ration thus  published  did  not  bear  the  names  of  the 
members,  for  as  yet  it  had  not  been  signed  by  them. 
It  was  authenticated,  'ike  other  papers  of  the  Congress, 
by  the  signatures  of  the  President  and  Secretary.  On 
the  iothof  July,  as  appears  by  the  secret  journal,  Con- 
gress Resolved,  That  the  declaration  passed  on  the 
fourth,  be  fairly  engrossed  on  parchment,  with  the  tide 
and  style  of  'The  unanimous  Declaration  of  thk 


290       RECEPTION  OF  THE  DECLARATION  BY  THE  ARMY. 

ration  now  pass  ? '  was  put  by  the  President,  the  clear,  firm  aye  rose  as  one 
voice.  The  Secretary  laid  the  greatest  State  paper  in  the  history  of  human 
government,  upon  the  desk  of  the  President,  and  it  received  the  bold,  eternal 
autograph  of  John  Hancock. 

The  Declaration  went  forth  authenticated  by  John  Hancock,  as  President, 
and  Charles  Thompson,  as  Secretary.  It  had  received  the  vote  of  every 
Colony  except  New  York,  its  delegates  not  having  the  authority  at  that 
moment  to  act.  But  in  the  new  Convention  of  that  State  on  the  9th  of  July 
it  was  referred  to  a  committee  of  which  John  Jay  was  chairman,  and  this 
committee  without  delay,  reported  resolutions  pronouncing  the  reasoning  of 
the  Declaration  cogent  and  conclusive,  and  that  the  convention  were  resolved 
1  to  support  it  with  their  fortunes  and  their  lives.'  It  was  adopted,  and  de- 
clared to  be  the  act  of  the  representatives  of  the  State  of  New  York ;  and 
thus  the  Declaration  became  the  act  of  all  the  United  Colonies. 

From  the  Journals  of  the  Congress,  we  learn  that  on  the  19th  of  July,  it 
was  resolved:  "That  the  Declaration  passed  on  the  Fourth  be  fairly 
engrossed  on  parchment  with  the  title  and  style  of  '  The  Unanimous 
Declaration  of  the  Thirteen  United  States  of  America,'  and  that  the  same 
when  engrossed,  be  signed  by  every  member  of  Congress."  The  record  of  the 
second  day  of  August,  says :  '  The  Declaration  being  engrossed,  and  com- 
pared at  the  table,  was  signed  by  the  members.' l 

How  the  Declaration  was  Received  by  the  Army  a?id  the  State  Assemblies. — 
It  was  at  once  officially  proclaimed,  and  by  the  fleetest  couriers  it  was  carried 

Thirteen  United  States  of  America  ;  and  that  the  der  those  censures  ;  for  though  their  people  had  very 

same,  when  engrossed,  be  signed  by  every  member  of  few  slaves  themselves,  yet  they  had  been  pretty  consid- 

Congress.'     And  on  the  second  day  of  August  fol-  erable  carriers  of  them  to  others.' 

lowing,   '  the  Declaration,   being  engrossed  and  com-  Mr.   Frothingham   characterizes    these    alterations 

pared  at  the  table,  was  signed  by  the  members.     So  thus: — 'The    striking  out  of  the  passage,    declaring 

that  it  happens,  fellow-citizens,  that  we  pay  these  hon-  the  slave-trade  piratical  warfare  against  human  nature 

ors  to  their  memory  on  the  anniversary  of  that  day  (2d  itself  was   deeply  regretted  by  many  of  that  genera- 

of  August)  on  which  these  great  men  actually  signed  tion.     Other  alterations  were  for  the  better,  making  the 

their  names  to  the  Declaration.     The  Declaration  was  paper  more  dispassionate  and  terse,  and — what  was  no 

thus  made,  that  is,  it  passed  and  was  adopted  as  an  small  improvement — more  brief  and  exact.' 
act  of  Congress  on   the    fourth  of  July  :    it  was  then  l  This  manuscript  is  preserved   in  the  office  of  the 

signed  and  certified  by  the  President  and   Secretary,  Secretary  of  State.    In  the  proposals  to  print  an  engrav- 

like  other  acts.   The  Fourth  of  July,  therefore,  is  the  ing  of  it  with  facsimiles  of  the  signers,  dated  March, 

anniversary  of  the  Declaration.     But  the  signa-  1816,  it  was  said  that  there  was  no  authentic  copy  of 

tures  of  the  members  present  were  made  to  it,   being  it  in  print.      This  splendid  engraving  was  published 

then  engrossed  on  parchment,  on  the  second  day  of  in  November,    1819.      A  facsimile  of  the  engrossed 

August     Absent  members  afterwards  signed  as  they  copy  is  in  the  Fifth  Series  of  Force's  Archives,  vol.  i., 

came  in  ;  and,  indeed,  it  bears  the  names  of  some  who  page  595. 

were  not  chosen  members  of  Congress  until  after  the  The  statements  relative  to  the  signing  of  the  Decla- 

fourth   of  July.     The   interest  belonging   to    the    sub-  ration  are  conflicting.     Jefferson   states    that  it  was 

ject  will  be  sufficient,  I  hope,  to  justify  these  details.' —  signed  generally  on  the  fourth  (Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  page 

Discourse   in    Commemoration  of  the  Lives   and  94).     And  he  in  another  place  reiterates  this  statement. 

Services  of  Adams  and  Jefferson,  by  Daniel  Web-  '  But  this  manuscript  is  not  known  to  be  extant'  (Ran- 

ster.  dall's  Jefferson,  vol.  i.,  page  71). 

In  speaking  of  the  changes  that  were  debated  and  John  Adarns  on  the  9th  of  July  (Works,  vol.  ix., 

made  in  the  phraseology,  allegations,  and  principles  of  page  417)  says  :  '  As  soon  as  an  American  Seal  is  pre- 

the  Declaration  he  had  drawn  up,  and  which  was  sub-  pared,  I  conjecture  the  Declaration  will  be  superscribed 

jected  to  such  severe  scrutiny,  Jefferson  relates  in  his  by  all  the  members.' 

'Memoirs,'    vol.    i.,   page    15: — 'The    pusillanimous  Thomas  McKean,  in  a  letter  dated  June  15,  1817, 

idea  that  we  had  friends  in    England  worth  keeping  (Niles'  Register,  vol.  xii.,  page  120)  says  :   '  Probably 

terms  with    haunted   the    minds  of  many.     For  this  copies  with  the  names  then  signed  to  it,  were  printed 

reason  those  passages  which  conveyed  censure  on  the  in  August,  1776.     One  of  the  signers,  Thornton,  was 

people  of  England  were   struck  out,  lest  they  should  not  a   member  until   November  4th,  but  the  list  was 

give   them  offence.     The  clause,  too,  reprobating  the  otherwise  incorrect.     The  early  lists  in  law  books  and 

enslaving  the  inhabitants  of  Africa  was  struck  out  in  other  works  omitted  the  name  of  McKean,  which  is  not 

complacence  to  South  Carolina  and  Georgia,  who  had  in  the  list  printed  by  Ramsey,  1789  (vol.  i.,  page  346X 

never  attempted  to  restrain  the  importation  of  slaves,  nor  in  the  Journals  of  Congress,  published  by  authority 

and  who,  on  the  contrary,  wished  to  continue  it     Our  by  Folwell  in  1800  (vol.  h\,  p.  232).' 
Not  them  brethren  also,  I  believe,  felt  a  little  tender  un- 


l>ECLAia.IIO.N    Or    LMJU't.S^Li'CC    UEAU   XU   ZilL  AUill. 


ITS  RECEPTION  BY  THE  PEOPLE.  291 

to  the  most  distant  Colonies.  In  an  appropriate  and  eloquent  letter,  the  Presi- 
dent  communicated  it  to  the  Commander-in-Chief,  to  be  read  at  the  head  of 
the  army.  Five  days  after  it  was  passed,  Washington  in  a  General  Order 
said : — 'The  General  hopes  this  important  event  will  serve  as  an  incentive  to 
every  officer  and  soldier,  to  act  with  fidelity  and  courage,  as  knowing  that 
now  the  peace  and  safety  of  his  country  depend — under  God — solely  on  the 
success  of  our  arms ;  and  that  he  is  now  in  the  service  of  a  State  possessed  of 
sufficient  power  to  reward  his  merit,  and  advance  him  to  the  highest  honors 
of  a  free  country.'  At  six  o'clock  that  evening,  the  Declaration  itself  was 
read  at  the  head  of  each  brigade,  and  every  soldier  had  a  copy  for  himself. 
In  his  reply  to  the  President,  Washington  said: — 'The  expressions  and  be- 
havior of  officers  and  men  testify  their  warmest  approbation.'  From  Ticon- 
deroga,  our  northernmost  military  post,  they  wrote  back  : — "  The  language  of 
every  man's  countenance  here  is,  '  Now  we  are  a  free  people,  and  have  a  name 
among  the  States  of  the  world.'" 

From  the  State  Assemblies,  and  from  every  Legislature  and  Convention  in 
every  State,  as  fast  as  they  could  come,  responses  were  received,  all  animated 
by  the  same  fervid  and  patriotic  spirit — all  containing  assurances  of  their  de- 
termination at  every  hazard,  with  their  lives,  their  fortunes,  and  their  sacred 
honor,  to  sustain  the  Declaration.  The  South  Carolina  Assembly  said  :  ■  We 
receive  the  news  with  the  most  unspeakable  satisfaction  ;  and  we  are  deter- 
mined at  eveiy  hazard,  to  endeavor  to  maintain  it,  so  that  after  we  have  de- 
parted, our  children  and  their  latest  posterity  may  have  cause  to  bless  our 
memory.'  The  Maryland  Assembly :  '  Would  maintain  the  freedom  and  in- 
dependence of  the  United  States,  with  their  lives  and  fortunes.'  North 
Carolina  would  stand  by,  *  under  the  sanction  of  virtue,  honor,  and  the  sacred 
love  of  liberty  and  their  country.'  The  Pennsylvania  Convention  would 
maintain  it,  '  in  behalf  of  themselves,  their  constituents,  and  before  God  and 
the  world.'  And  thus  the  United  Colonies,  one  and  all,  took  their  station — a 
leagued,  confederate,  blended,  single  Nation — The  United  States. 

Fifty-six  years  later,  in  President  Jackson's  Proclamation  against  nullifi- 
cation in  South  Carolina,  he  recalled  the  feeling  and  the  fact,  in  those  unmis- 
takable words :  '  That  decisive  and  important  step,  Independence,  was 
taken  jointly.     We  declared  ourselves  a  nation  by  a  joint,  not  by  several  acts.' 

By  the  People. — Acclamations  of  joy  and  thanksgiving  went  up  from  every 
part  of  the  country  where  the  news  of  the  Declaration  travelled.  Hearty 
responses  were  echoed  from  every  deliberative  assembly,  every  convention, 
and  every  public  gathering  ;  from  every  workshop  of  labor,  and  every  field  of 
toil ;  across  every  valley,  and  from  every  mountain-side ;  from  every  college 
and  district  school-house,  and  from  every  altar  of  prayer.  Statues  of  bronze, 
and  lead,  and  marble,  and  granite,  which  had  been  inaugurated  to  kings,  were 
torn  from  their  pedestals,  and  shivered  to  atoms,  or  melted  down  into  bullets 
or  cannon ;  and  the  name  of  George  III.  was  suppressed  in  public  prayers. 
Ensigns  of  royalty,  crowns,  lions,  and  sceptres,  were  swept  away  like  chaflf ; 


292  ITS  RECEPTION  B  V  MANKIND. 

and  in  their  places  perched  the  bald-headed  American  Eagle,  winged  in  a  con. 
stellation  of  thirteen  stars,  with  the  stripes  of  white  and  red,  which,  being 
adopted  now  as  the  national  standard  waved  over  the  Thirteen  Independent 
Colonies. 

Wrote  Samuel  Adams :  *  Was  there  ever  a  revolution  brought  about, 
especially  one  so  important  as  this,  without  great  internal  discords  and  violent 
convulsions  ?  The  people,  I  am  told,  recognize  the  Revolution  as  though  it 
were  a  decree  from  heaven.'  '  This,'  wrote  John  Adams  on  the  day  before 
the  adoption  of  the  Declaration,  'will  be  a  memorable  epoch  in  the  history 
of  America.  I  am  apt  to  believe  that  it  will  be  celebrated  by  succeeding 
generations  as  the  great  anniversary  festival.  It  ought  to  be  commemorated 
as  the  day  of  deliverance,  by  solemn  acts  of  devotion  to  Almighty  God.'  On 
the  sixth  of  July,  Colonel  Haslett,  commanding  the  Continental  troops  in 
Delaware,  wrote  to  Caesar  Rodney  : — *  I  congratulate  you  on  the  important 
day  which  restores  to  every  American  his  birthright ;  a  day  which  every  free- 
man will  record  with  gratitude,  and  the  millions  of  posterity  will  read  with 
rapture.'  As  a  sample  of  the  united  voice  of  a  free  press,  the  Contine?ttal 
Journal,  of  Boston,  July  18,  said  : — '  The  4th  instant  was  rendered  remarkable 
by  the  most  important  event  that  ever  happened  to  the  American  Colonies ;  an 
event  which  will  doubtless  be  celebrated  through  a  long  succession  of  future 
ages  by  anniversary  commemorations.'  James  Madison  termed  the  Declaration 
'The  fundamental  act  of  union — the  embodiment  of  the  public  will  as  ?> 
source  of  authority,  whenever  it  is  the  will  of  the  people  composing  one 
nation.'  Thus  had  the  already  matured  sentiment  of  nationality  given  its  ex- 
pression in  a  concentrated  and  enduring  form — the  founders  of  the  Republic 
named  it  the  Birth  of  the  Nation. 

How  the  Declaration  was  Received  by  Mankind. — Sismondi,  in  his  History 
of  the  French,  said:  'The  Declaration  had  an  immense  effect.  .  .  The  cause 
was  so  noble,  and  the  effort  was  so  grand,  that  there  was  not  a  doubt,  not  a 
hesitation,  in  the  sentiment  of  the  entire  world ;  and  the  governments  and 
rulers  of  states  would  seek  glory  by  thinking  like  the  people.'  Buckle,  the 
most  advanced  of  all  the  historians  of  Civilization,  records  his  sympathies 
with  '  the  great  people  who  gforiously  obtained  their  independence.  Their 
Declaration  ought  to  be  hung  up  in  the  nursery  of  every  king,  and  blazoned 
on  the  porch  of  every  royal  palace.' 

On  the  eye  of  every  outwatcher  for  the  dawning  of  a  better  day  for  the 
human  race,  standing  on  the  grave  of  the  buried  liberties  of  Europe,  the 
light  of  the  rising  Republic  of  the  West  shone  like  a  new  star  that  had  just 
taken  its  place  in  an  old  constellation.  Statesmen  contemplated  the  specta- 
cle with  amazement,  and  wondered — the  wisest  of  them — not  what  they  should 
do  with  the  earthquake,  but  what  the  earthquake  would  do  with  them  ;  while 
in  the  ears  of  the  multitude,  wearied  with  their  burdens,  and  worn  in  their 
hopes,  the  news  sounded  like  a  fresh  Evangel.  '  That  is  the  work  of  the  great 
Franklin  ! '    exclaimed  Volta,  his  correspondent.     '  Now  may  the  multitude 


ITS  RECEPTION  BY  OUR  ENEMIES.  293 

hope,  if  crowns  begin  to  fall  from  the  heads  of  tyrants,'  exclaimed  that  hearty 
hater  of  despotism,  Vittorio  Alfieri ;  while  the  young  Lafayette,  with  a  sword 
by  his  side  ready  to  be  drawn  in  the  cause  of  liberty  before  he  had  yet  reached 
man's  estate,  in  a  transport  of  enthusiasm  exclaimed  : — '  I  will  yet  live  to  fight 
by  the  side  of  George  Washington.'  America  was  to  become  the  teacher  of 
mankind  in  a  new  system  of  political  rights,  and  in  the  Declaration  of  In- 
dependence she  had  given  her  first  lesson.  'America,'  says  Rotteck,  the 
German  historian,  '  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence  planted  herself  be- 
tween magnificence  and  ruin.'  Walter  Savage  Landor,  with  a  heart  throb- 
bing with  love  to  all  mankind,  paid  this  willing  tribute  :  'America  was  never 
so  great  as  on  the  day  she  declared  her  independence.'  Our  schoolboys  all 
remember  the  words  of  Phillips,  the  fiery  Irish  orator.  He  gave  none  too 
warm  an  expression  to  the  gratitude  and  love  of  the  green  island  for  the 
land  which  was  to  prove  •  the  home  of  her  emigrant,  the  asylum  of  her  op- 
pressed.' 

Without  carefully  tracing  the  records  of  European  thought  at  that  period, 
as  scattered  through  her  political  literature,  little  idea  can  be  gained  of  the 
effect  which  the  news  of  the  Declaration  produced  upon  foreign  nations.  It 
is  even  yet  premature  to  form  any  adequate  conception  of  its  ultimate  in- 
fluence on  the  fortunes  of  the  race.  It  began  at  once  to  revolutionize  the 
world.  But  a  few  years  passed  before  France  was  on  fire,  and  all  Europe  in 
convulsions.1  ■  Nor  from  that  day  to  this,  has  the  wearied  arm  of  injured  man 
been  lifted  to  level  on  the  breast  of  his  spoiler  one  more  blow,  whose  in- 
spiration did  not  spring  from  the  Declaration  of  Independence  :  and,  through 
all  time  to  come,  every  such  blow  will  be  coupled  with  an  invocation  of  that 
Eternal  Charter. 

How  our  Enemies  Received  the  News. — Poor  George  III.  was  thrown 
into  transports  of  rage.  Forgetting  the  wonted  stolidity  of  his  character,  he 
gave  way  to  paroxysms  of  anger  and  hate.  Rebels  and  traitors  were  epithets 
which  no  longer  met  the  case ;  he  branded  the  Signers  of  the  Declaration 
with  still  harder  names,  and  the  brand  was  malignantly  held  on  the  fore- 
head of  America,  till  the  crazed  brain  of  the  poor  old  monarch,  with  the 
lying  lips  of  his  bigoted  worshippers,  had  alike  rotted  in  the  grave.  But 
among  the  whole  human  race,  these  blasphemers  of  Liberty  stood  alone. 

Personal  Accusations  against  the  King  of  England. — It  was  alleged  at  the 
time,  that  the  language  of  the  Declaration  was  characterized  by  unworthy  per- 
sonalities against  the  ruler  of  a  great  State  : — that  the  sovereign  of  a  consti- 
tutional monarchy  should  not  have  been  held  responsible  for  the  acts  0/  a 
free  Parliament.  Mr.  Webster,  in  his  eulogy  on  Adams  and  Jefferson,  set  this 
matter  in  the  proper  light.     He  drew  a  clear  distinction,  which  every  Amer- 

1  The  great  wheel  of  political  revolution  began  to  fearful  celerity,  till  at  length  like  the  chariot  wheels  ii 

move  in   America.     Here   its   rotation  was  guarded,  the  races  of  antiquity,  it  took  fire  from  the  rapidity  of 

r^ular   and  safe.     Transferred  to  the  other  continent,  its  own  motion,  and  blazed  onward,  spreading  conflag. 

from  unfortunate  but  natural  causes  it  received  an  ir-  ration  and  terror  around.— Webster  on  Washington. 
regular  and  violent  impulse;  it  whirled  along  with  a 


2Q4       HOW  COULD  THE  DECLARATION  BE  MADE  GOOD? 

ican  should  understand  and  remember,  between  the  allegiance  by  which  the 
Colonies  held  themselves  bound  to  the  king,  and  any  and  all  obligations  of 
obedience  to  Parliament.  They  disclaimed  the  authority  of  Parliament 
altogether.  '  The  tie,'  he  says,  *  which  our  Revolution  was  to  break,  did  not 
subsist  between  us  and  the  British  Parliament,  or  between  us  and  the  British 
Government  in  the  aggregate,  but  directly  between  us  and  the  king  himself. 
They  had  uniformly  denied  that  Parliament  had  authority  to  make  laws  for 
them.  There  was,  therefore,  no  subjection  to  Parliament  to  be  thrown  off. 
Parliament  is  not  so  much  as  mentioned  in  the  whole  instrument.  Hence, 
there  was  this  clear  and  obvious  necessity  of  founding  the  Declaration  on  the 
misconduct  of  the  king  himself;  and  this  gives  to  that  instrument  its  personal 
application,  and  its  character  of  direct  and  pointed  accusation.'  * 

An  American  Party  in  Great  Britain.,  and  on  the  Continent. — The  act 
of  Declaration  was,  however,  applauded  by  the  enlightened  and  liberal  por- 
tion of  the  British  nation ;  and,  from  that  day  to  this,  the  noblest  English- 
men have  been  proud  to  rank  themselves  among  the  friends  of  America.  As 
had  been  clearly  predicted  also,  by  the  most  sagacious  members  of  the  Con- 
tinental Congress,  that  final  announcing  ourselves  as  a  nation,  commanded 
the  respect  of  every  cabinet  on  the  Continent  of  Europe,  and  opened  the  way 
for  diplomatic  intercourse,  and  confidential  and  public  negotiations  with 
France,  Holland,  and  other  States.  They  soon  afterwards  saw  their  way  to 
aid  the  American  cause ;  and  at  a  not  late  period,  to  recognize  our  inde- 
pendence. 

How  was  the  Declaration  to  be  Made  Good 7 — This  was  the  next  great  ques- 
tion before  the  nation.  The  Declaration  itself  announced  the  American  Theory 
in  words,  '  the  memory  of  which,'  said  Buckle,  *  can  never  die.'  The  existence 
of  a  new  political  sovereignty  de  jure,  implied  the  necessity  of  establishing  it 
de  facto.  In  this  manner  only,  by  the  usages  of  international  law,  could  the 
new  Power  claim  admission  into  the  society  of  nations.  In  a  letter  to  James 
Warren,  Samuel  Adams  had  said  in  the  preceding  April : — '  The  child  In- 
dependence is  now  struggling  for  birth  :  I  trust  in  a  short  time  it  will  be  brought 
forth ;  and  in  spite  of  Pharaoh,  all  America  will  hail  the  dignified  stranger.' 
It  did ;  events  alone  were  to  determine  if  it  was  to  be  thus  hailed  by  man- 
kind. 

Resources  for  Achieving  Independence. — They  should  be  considered  in  the 
following  order  : 

Territory: — In  1783,  the  area  of  the  United  States  was  estimated  at  820,680  square 
miles.  In  1854,  at  2,936,166.  In  1868,  at  about  3,466,000.  The  following  are  the 
statistics: — 

1  In  Jefferson's  draught  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde-  submission  to  their  Parliament  was  no  part  of  our 

pendence  had  inserted  these  words  : — 'That  in  consti-  Constitution,  not  even  in  ia'ea,' — Congress  would  no! 

tuting  indeed  our  several  forms  of  government,  we  had  go  so  far  as  to  recognize  the  existence  of  the  British 

adopted  one  common  king,  thereby  laying  a  foundation  Parliament,  and  therefore  the  passage  was  struck  out. 
for  perpetual  league  and  amity  with  them;  but  that 


RESOURCES  OF  THE  COUNTRY.  295 

SQUARE   MILES 

Original  limits  of  the  Thirteen  States 820,680 

Louisiana,  purchased  of  France  in  1803,  for  $15,000,000 899,579 

Florida,  purchased  of  Spain  in  1809,  for  $3,000,000 66,900 

Territory,  confirmed  by  the  Oregon  Treaty  in  1842,  and  1846 308,052 

Texas,  annexed  in  1846  (Texas  debt),  $7,500,000 318,000 

New  Mexico  and  California  in  1847  (cost  of  the  war),  $15,000,000. . . .  522,955 

Arizona,  purchased  of  Mexico  in  1854,  for  $10,000,000 30,000 

Alaska,  purchased  of  Russia  in  1867,  for  $7,200,000 500,000 

3,466,166 

Of  that  portion  of  the  territory  of  North  America,  which  lies  between  the 
Alleghany  Mountains  and  the  Atlantic  coast  then  occupied  by  the  Thirteen 
Colonies,  Frothingham  says  :  '  This  region,  of  a  mean  breadth  of  about  one 
hundred  miles,  and  nine  hundred  miles  in  length,  is  characterized  as  a  long 
ridge  of  rock  and  sand,  presenting  obstacles,  rather  than  offering  temptations, 
to  the  husbandman.  It  had,  however,  no  wastes  like  the  deserts  of  Africa, 
and  no  impassable  barriers  between  the  north  and  the  south ;  while  parts  of  it 
were  enriched  by  nature  with  the  most  luxuriant  fruitfulness  of  the  torrid  zone. 
Its  coasts  were  admirably  adapted  to  foster  the  growth  of  a  commercial  ma- 
rine ;  and  its  long,  wide,  and  deep  rivers  invited  inter-communication.'  To 
the  rear  of  this  region  was  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi  which  De  Tocqueville 
declares  in  his  '  Democracy  in  America,'  to  be,  '  the  most  magnificent  dwell- 
ing-place prepared  by  God  for  man's  abode;1  while  the  whole  continent 
seemed  to  be  fashioned  by  providence  for  the  uses  of  a  great  nation.'  Writing 
to  Lord  Kames  in  1776,  Franklin  said:  *  America,  an  immense  territory, 
favored  by  nature  with  all  advantages  of  climate,  soils,  great  navigable  rivers, 
lakes,  etc.,  must  become  a  great  country,  populous  and  mighty.'  In  No.  2 
of  the  Federalist,  written  by  John  Jay  '  to  the  people  of  the  State  of  New 
York,'  printed  in  1787,  in  speaking  of  'independent  America  as  one  connect- 
ed,  fertile,  wide-spreading  country,  blest  with  a  variety  of  soils,  and  produc- 
tions, and  watered  with  innumerable  streams  for  the  delight  and  accommo- 
dation of  its  inhabitants,'  he  says  '  it  appears  as  if  it  was  the  design  of  Provi- 
dence that  an  inheritance  so  proper  and  convenient  for  a  band  of  brethren 
united  to  each  other  by  the  strongest  ties,  should  never  be  split  into  a  num- 
ber of  unsocial,  jealous  and  alien  sovereignties.' 

Agriculture. — It  was  in  its  infancy.  Little  more  was  produced  from  the 
soil  than  the  necessities  of  the  people  required.  All  the  implements  of  tillage 
were  of  primitive  simplicity,  and  the  labor  put  forth  upon  the  land  was 
mainly  by  sheer  brute  force.  For  agricultural  reliances  this  much  only  was 
certain — that  when  the  fields  were  not  '  trampled  by  the  hoof  of  war,'  there 

1  In  the  second  volume  of  Webster's  Works,  page  trade  between  Cincinnati  and  Pittsburg.   The  first  gov- 

607,  he  cites  as  of  authority  the  following  facts  from  ernment  vessel  appeared  on  Lake  Erie  in  1802  ;   th« 

Gallagher's  address  before  the  Ohio  Historical  Society:  first  steamboat  was  launched  at  Pittsburg  in  1811  ;  th« 

—*'  Prior  to  the  year  1800,  eight  or  ten  keel  boats  of  first  on  Lake  Michigan  in  1826;  and  they  first  appeared 

about  twenty-five  tons  each,  performed  all  the  carrying  at  Chicago  in  1832. 


2gb  AGRICULTURE  AND  POPULATION. 

would  be  always  a  prospect  of  enough  food  for  the  people,  no  matter  how 
many  of  its  men  were  sent  to  fight  its  battles,  nor  how  many  years  the  war 
might  last.  This  general  statement  must  suffice,  till  we  reach  the  close  of  the 
Revolution,  when  it  will  be  necessary  to  look  more  carefully  into  the  methods 
and  extent  of  agriculture,  and  how  its  products  were  increased. 

Population. — Until  the  year  1790,  when  the  first  census  of  the  popula- 
tion of  the  United  States  was  taken,  there  were  no  means  of  ascertaining 
their  exact  number.  The  estimates  differ  widely,  ranging  at  the  beginning  of 
the  Revolution,  from  two  millions  and  a  quarter,  as  high  as  three  millions  and 
twenty-six  thousand,  the  latter  being  the  estimate  of  Congress.  It  is  believed, 
however,  that  the  estimate  was  too  large,  and  that  this  number  could  not 
have  been  reached  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  I  am  inclined 
to  regard  the  calculation  of  Professor  Tucker,  in  his  History  of  the  United 
States,  volume  i.,  page  96,  as  being  the  most  reliable  yet  made.  At  the  date 
of  the  opening  of  the  Revolution,  he  makes  the  following  apportionment, 
which  doubtless  gives  the  relative  importance  of  the  Colonies  as  satisfactorily 
as  we  are  ever  likely  to  obtain  : 

Massachusetts 360,000 

New  Hampshire 80,000 

Connecticut 200,000 

Rhode  Island 50,000 

New  York 180,000 

New  Jersey 130,000 

Pennsylvania 300,000 

Delaware 40,000 

Maryland 220,000 

Virginia 560,000 

North  Carolina 260,000 

South  Carolina 180,000 

Georgia 30,000 

2,590,000 

In  this  case,  however,  the  resources  of  the  country  should  not  be 
measured  by  the  ordinary  standard  as  to  population.  It  will  give  a  better 
idea,  if  we  show  the  pro  rata  of  men  furnished  for  the  Revolutionary  armies 
drawn  from  the  whole  body  of  the  people.  When  in  1790,  in  the  first  Con- 
gress under  the  Constitution,  a  call  was  made  for  the  number  of  men 
furnished  for  the  war  by  each  State,  and  the  number  of  the  militia,  the  answer 
from  the  War  Department,  then  under  the  charge  of  General  Knox,  gave 
the  following  table,  which  is  copied  from  the  first  volume  of  American 
Archives : 


RE  VOL  UTIONAR  Y  TRO  OPS  AND  MILITIA.  2  9  J 

Statement  of  the  number  of  troops  and  militia  furnished  by  the  several  States,  for 

the  support  of  the  Revolutionary  war,  from  1775  to  1783,  inclusive. 

Number  of        Number  of        Total  militia      Conjectural 

continental  militia.  and  continental    estimate  of 

troops.  troops.  militia. 

Northern  States. 

New  Hampshire 12,496  2,093  J4>598  7»3°° 

Massachusetts 67,937  15,155  83,092  9,500 

Rhode  Island 5,908  4,284  10,192  1,500 

Connecticut 32,039  7.792  39>83!  3,000 

New  York I7>78i  3»3r2  21,093  8,750 

Pennsylvania. 25,608  7,357  32,965  2,ooo 

New  Jersey 10,727  6,055  16,782  2,500 

Total 172,496  46,048  218,553  30,950 

Southern  States. 

Delaware 2,387  376  2,763  1,000 

Maryland 13,912  5,464  19,376  4,000 

Virginia 26,672  4,163  30,835  21,880 

North  Carolina 7,263  2,716  9,969  12,000 

South  Carolina 5,5o8 5, 508  28,000 

Georgia 2,679 2,679  9,930 

Total 58,421  12,719  71,130  76,810 

It  should  be  understood  that,  at  this  time,  there  was  but  little  difference 
In  numbers  between  the  population  of  the  Southern  States  and  that  of  the 
Northern  States.  By  the  census  of  1 790,  the  Southern  had  a  population  of 
1,956,354  ;  the  Northern  had  a  population  of  1,968,455.  But,  notwithstand- 
ing this  comparative  equality  of  population  in  the  two  sections,  the  North 
furnished  vastly  more  men  than  the  South. 

Of  continental  troops,  the  Southern  States  furnished  58,421  ;  the  North- 
ern furnished  172,496  ;  making  about  three  men  furnished  to  the  continental 
army  by  the  Northern  States,  to  one  from  the  Southern. 

But  these  figures,  surprising  as  they  are,  would  not  alone  account  for 
the  great  results  achieved  during  the  War  for  Independence.  For  this,  we 
must  look  at  the  character  of  the  men  whose  qualifications  were  so  peculi- 
arly adapted  to  the  hard  services  they  performed.  In  some  respects,  they 
differed  from  the  great  body  of  armies  ordinarily  serving  in  campaigns. 

First : — The  rank  and  file  was  made  up  of  primitive  men,  and  mostly  in 
the  full  vigor  of  manhood  ;  for  as  a  rule,  the  youth  of  the  country  staid  at  home 
to  go  to  school,  or  work  in  the  shops,  or  on  the  farms.  They  had  not  only 
been  enervated  by  no  luxury,  but  they  had  been  inured  to  health,  and  con- 
tinuous labor,  and  by  consent  of  the  military  men  of  the  Revolution,  both 
American  and  foreign  officers,  they  were  unequalled  by  the  troops  of  any 
nation,  in  their  ability  to  endure  exposure,  privation,  and  fatigue.  With 
scarcely  an  exception,  they  had  been  accustomed  from  boyhood  to  the  use  of 
firearms.      The  rifle  has  always  been  the  toy  of  the  American  boy,  and  in 


298  ELEMENTS  OF  THE  REVOLUTIONARY  ARMY. 

subduing   the    continent,   it  has  been   the   chief   reliance   of   the   pioneei 
settler. 

Second : — Intelligence.  What  is  popularly  called  ignorance,  was  unknown 
from  the  earliest  life  of  the  Colonies  ;  and  just  so  far  as  intelligence,  linked 
with  independent  thinking,  and  the  ingenuity  which  is  begotten  by  necessity 
for  economy  and  improvised  contrivances,  with  habits  of  reliance  on  self- 
judgment,  make  men  useful  and  strong,  just  in  that  proportion  did  the  Ameri- 
can soldiers  surpass  in  efficiency  those  brought  against  them. 

Third ; — Devotion  to  country.  To  be  patriotic  was  the  habit  of  men  in  those 
days ;  to  be  true  to  the  flag  was  the  law — to  betray  it, — the  cases  were  too  rare 
to  mention.  The  records  of  the  Revolution  are  filled  with  instances  of  devotion 
to  the  cause  of  Independence,  which,  however  admirable,  became  too  com- 
mon to  be  distinguished.  When  men  went  into  that  war,  they  made  up  their 
minds  to  win  or  lose  all ;  hence  there  was  no  half-way  work.  Every  man 
put  his  whole  strength  into  the  work  of  every  day.  There  was  deliberation 
in  council,  but  there  was  no  slow  acting.  When  an  officer  was  asked  for  a 
man  to  perform  some  special  service,  he  was  at  a  loss  whom  to  choose 
amongst  so  many.  It  grew  into  a  proverb  when  some  man  of  special  qualities 
was  called  for,  *  Take  the  first  man  you  lay  your  hands  on.' l  From  the 
highest  to  the  lowest,  they  all  had  a  common  interest — everything  was  at  stake 
for  every  man.  It  is  evident  enough  that  few  armies  have  been  made  up  of 
such  material.  As  fast  as  European  officers  became  acquainted  with  these 
characteristics,  just  as  fast  did  the  words  fall  from  their  mouth  :  *  Such  men 
can  never  be  conquered.' 

These  were  about  all  the  resources  the  Americans  had  to  carry  on  the 
war  for  the  first  two  or  three  years.  The  Colonies  were  poor.  There  was 
no  money ;  there  was  no  machinery  for  manufacturing  firearms,  or  other 
munitions  of  war.  The  raw  material  was  obtained  only  by  the  hardest,  and 
almost  everything  had  to  be  done  'by  hand.'  As  for  credit,  it  scarcely  oc- 
curred to  anybody  to  ask  it.  Some  of  the  Colonies,  especially  Massachusetts, 
Rhode  Island,  Connecticut,  and  New  York,  had  indeed  built  up  a  consider- 
able commerce  with  the  West  Indies,  and  other  foreign  countries ;  and  the 
hardy  mariners  of  New  England  were  cultivating  the  fisheries  of  Newfound- 
land, and  even  chasing  the  whale  of  the  Northern  Ocean.  But  hereafter, 
any  American  vessel  which  ventured  to  sea,  could  expect  to  escape  capture 
only  by  fast  sailing,  or  cutting  her  way  against  odds.  The  whole  Atlantic  sea- 
board was  blockaded.  No  help  could  for  a  long  time  be  looked  for  from 
abroad,  and  nothing  was  left  but  for  the  brave  Colonists  who  had  defied  the 
mightiest  empire  on  the  globe,  but  to  go  into  battle  trusting  to  their  own 
valor,  the  justice  of  their  cause,  and  the  help  of  Heaven. 

How  Effectually  this  Work  was  to  be  Done. — It  is  no  part  of  my  plan  to 

1  It  reminds  us  of  a  well-known  incident  in  the  be-  ment  through  Maryland.  The  commander  asked  any* 
ginning  of  the  Civil  War,  when  an  accident  disabled  the  body  who  could  repair  it,  to  come  forward  ; — twenly-sui 
engine  of  a  train  canying  the  6th  Massachusetts  regi-    engineers  instantly  stepped  from  the  ranks. 


THE  EMPIRE  TO  CRUSH  THE  REPUBLIC.  299 

write  a  history  of  the  Revolution,  much  less  to  describe  its  battles.  All  we 
can  do  will  be  to  keep  our  eyes  steadily  enough  fixed  on  the  national  ensign 
as  it  waved  or  drooped,  to  follow  the  fortunes  of  the  war ;  while  we  must  trace 
with  special  care  the  causes  of  our  chief  successes  and  failures  in  the  great 
business  of  emancipating  ourselves  from  the  political,  as  well  as  the  military 
thraldom  of  the  Old  World,  and  in  the  consolidation  of  thirteen  separate  and 
independent  Colonies,  into  a  higher  and  better  form  of  free  government  than 
had  yet  been  established  among  men. 

I  am  endeavoring  to  write  a  work  of  instruction,  as  well  as  of  popular 
interest.  I  am  more  anxious  to  explain  facts  of  deep  significance,  than  to 
captivate  the  reader  by  stirring  narration.  I  hoped  to  escape,  in  some 
measure,  the  charge  which  an  ingenious  writer  not  long  ago  brought  against 
the  historians  of  our  country,  for  his  criticism  seemed  to  be  at  least  partly 
just : — '  There  has  not  been  a  single  writer  who  has  attempted  to  distinguish 
between  the  History  of  the  United  States,  and  the  Political  Literature  of  the 
country ;  that  is>  in  giving  an  account  of  the  facts,  of  a  public  or  a  private 
nature,  that  controlled  the  events  of  any  era  or  epoch,  almost  all  have  alto- 
gether failed  to  look  to  the  inner  influence,  so  to  speak,  of  the  writings,  the 
proceedings  of  public  bodies,  the  State  papers,  that  in  each  case  preceded, 
and  moulded,  and  accompanied  every  important  occurrence  of  the  different 
phases  of  our  national  existence.  They  have  confined  their  attention  too 
much  to  the  effect  of  the  development  of  both  the  political  and  social  progress 
of  our  earlier  existence,  and  have  paid  too  little  heed  to  the  causes  of  the 
gradual  expansion  of  political  opinions,  and  the  origin  of  our  steady  and  sue 
cessful  advance  to  independence  and  constitutional  government.'  ' 

The  Force  of  the  Empire  invoked  to  crush  the  Republic. — Astounded  and 
enraged  at  the  hardihood  and  audacity  of  the  rebel  Congress,  the  king  his  min- 
isters and  his  Parliament  determined  to  strike  one  blow  that  would  end  the 
Rebellion.  Accordingly  Gen.  Howe,  and  the  Admiral  of  the  same  name — 
the  one  commanding  the  naval,  and  the  other  the  land  forces — were  ordered 
to  New  York  ;  and,  a  few  days  after  the  Declaration  of  Independence — July 
1 2th,  '76 — these  experienced  commanders  had  posted  themselves  on,  and 
around  Staten  Island,  with  more  than  thirty  thousand  fighting  men.  The 
commanders  were  also  empowered  to  act  as  commissioners  to  proclaim  par- 
don to  all  who  would  lay  down  their  arms,  and  resume  their  allegiance.  Gen- 
eral Howe  seems  to  have  been  a  man  of  humane  disposition,  and  he  believed 
that  the  presence  of  so  overwhelming  a  force  would  crush  the  Rebellion,  and 
save  the  effusion  of  blood.  Every  effort  was  made  to  impair  the  confidence  of 
the  people  in  the  acts  of  the  Provincial  Congress  ;  but  when  these  attempts 
failed,  Howe  wrote  a  letter  directed  to  Mr.  Washington.  It  was  returned  to 
the  writer  unopened,  with  the  intimation  that  he  could  receive  no  communi- 
cation that  was  not  addressed  to  him  as  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  Ameri- 
can forces ;  as  a  private  man,  he  could  hold  no  intercourse  with  the  enemies 

1  The  Penn  Monthly,  for  August,  1871,  voL  ii.,  p.  379. 


3°o  THE  BATTLE  OF  LONG  ISLAND. 

of  his  country.  Further  attempts  were  made  by  addressing  him  as  ■  George 
Washington,  Esq.,'  etc.  The  same  result  followed.  It  was  then  determined 
to  take  New  York,  and  annihilate  the  main  body  of  the  American  army. 
They  could  then  easily  succeed  in  cutting  off  all  communication  between 
New  York  and  the  Southern  colonies  ;  and  Sir  Guy  Carleton  was  prepared, 
with  thirteen  thousand  men,  to  descend  from  Canada  to  meet  Lord  Howe  in 
his  advance  up  the  Hudson  to  Lake  Champlain. 

By  reinforcements  of  the  provincial  militia,  Washington  had  now  under 
his  command,  nominally,  twenty-seven  thousand  men.  But,  owing  to  sickness, 
and  a  short  provision  of  arms,  scarcely  one-half  of  this  number  could  be  called 
into  requisition ;  and  even  they  were  without  order  or  discipline.  But  poorly 
provided  as  he  was  with  the  materials  of  war,  he  resolved  not  to  abandon  the 
important  post  of  New  York,  until  after  a  hard  struggle. 

The  Battle  of  Long  Island. — That  struggle  was  at  hand.  On  the  25  th  of 
August,  the  British  had  landed  twenty  thousand  effective  men,1  and  forty 
cannon  on  the  western  end  of  Long  Island,  between  New  Utrecht — now  Fort 
Hamilton — and  Gravesend,  and  they  posted  themselves  in  a  line  stretching  as 
far  as  the  Flatlands,  only  four  miles  from  the  fortified  camp  of  General  Sullivan 
on  Brooklyn  Heights.  '  It  was,'  says  Bancroft,  *  the  most  perfect  army  of 
that  day  in  the  world,  for  experience,  discipline,  equipments,  and  artillery ; 
and  was  supported  by  more  than  four  hundred  ships  and  transports  in  the 
bay;  by  ten  ships  of  the  line,  and  twenty  frigates,  besides  bomb-ketches, 
galiots,  and  other  small  vessels.  Against  this  vast  armament  the  Americans 
on  the  Island,  after  repeated  reinforcements,  were  no  more  than  eight  thou- 
sand men,  most  of  whom  were  volunteers  or  militia ;  and  they  had  not  the 
aid  of  a  single  platoon  of  cavalry,  nor  one  ship  of  war.'  A  large  detachment 
was  at  once  despatched  by  Washington  under  General  Putnam,  who  was  to 
take  the  chief  command  of  the  little  army — all  Washington  could  spare  to 
resist  the  assault  of  a  vastly  superior  number.  The  sudden  illness  of  General 
Greene,  who  alone,  from  his  complete  knowledge  of  the  ground  and  superior 
generalship,  was  equal  to  such  a  work,  was  regarded  at  the  time,  as  it  has 
ever  since  been,  an  unmixed  misfortune.  Supposing  that  an  attack  would 
be  simultaneously  made  by  the  fleet  on  New  York, — as  Howe  had  intended, 
and  which  nothing  but  a  sudden  change  in  the  wind  prevented, — Washington 
could  not  leave  the  city  in  time  to  help  the  army  across  the  river,  and  as  he 
landed,  later  in  the  day,  and  rode  through  our  broken  lines,  he  saw  that  it  was 
a  hopeless  defeat. 

1  There  had  been   so  much  misconception  about  rank  and  file,  of  which  1,677  were  sick.'    It  is  charitable 

the  numbers  of  British  troops  engaged  in  the  Battle  of  f  suppose  that  his  memory  was  for  the  moment  con- 

.,  ,  fused;  on  August  27,  1770,  his  rank  and  hie  amounted 

Long  Island,  that  the  time  had  fully  come  to  get  at  the  to  24,247,  apart  from  the  royalist  force  under    Briga- 

facts.     Bancroft    has   set  the  matter  at  rest  on   un-  dier    De    Lancey.      MSS.  in  my  possession  from  the 

questionable  authority.      In  his  ninth  volume,  p.  85,  is  British  State-paper  Office.     Sir  George  Collier  writes 

^  #  .        *  that  the  army  with  Howe  on  Long  Island    amounted 

fou  td  the  following  statement :  now  t0  upwards  of  20,000,  besides  those  who  remained 

"Howe,  in  the  Observations  annexed  to  his  Nar-  on  Staten  Island.'     Detail  of  Services  by  Sir  Georga 

-ative,  p  45,  wrote  thus  :  '  I  landed  upon  Long  Island  Collier    in    Naval  Chronicle,  xxxii.  271.      Sir  Georgi 

with  bet  «reen  15,000  and  16,000  rank  and  file,  having  Collier  was  employed  at  the  time    to  cover  the  land* 

left  the  lemainder  of  the  army  for  the  defence  of  Staten  ing  of  the  troops," 
Island  ;  my  whole  force  at  that  time  consisted  of  20, 121 


WASHINGTON'S  ADDRESS  TO  THE  ARMY.  3©1 

Washington' s  Address  to  the  Army  before  the  Battle  of  Long  Island. — '  The 
time  is  now  near  at  hand,  which  must  probably  determine  whether  Americans 
are  to  be  freemen  or  slaves ;  whether  they  are  to  have  any  property  they  can 
call  their  own ;  whether  their  houses  and  farms  are  to  be  pillaged  and 
destroyed,  and  themselves  consigned  to  a  state  of  wretchedness,  from  which 
no  human  efforts  will  deliver  them.  The  fate  of  unborn  millions  will  now 
depend,  under  God,  on  the  courage  and  conduct  of  this  arm)'-.  Our  cruel 
and  unrelenting  enemy  leaves  us  only  the  choice  of  a  brave  resistance,  or  the 
most  abject  submission.    We  have,  therefore,  to  resolve  to  conquer  or  to  die. 

'  Our  own,  our  country's  honor,  calls  upon  us  for  a  vigorous  and  manly 
exertion ;  and  if  we  now  shamefully  fail,  we  shall  become  infamous  to  the 
whole  world.  Let  us  then  rely  on  the  goodness  of  our  cause,  and  the  aid  of 
the  Supreme  Being,  in  whose  hand  victory  is,  to  animate  and  encourage  us 
to  great  and  noble  actions.  The  eyes  of  all  our  countrymen  are  now  upon 
us,  and  we  shall  have  their  blessings  and  praises,  if  happily  we  are  the  instru- 
ments of  saving  them  from  {he  tyranny  meditated  against  them.  Let  us 
therefore  animate  and  encourage  each  other,  and  show  the  whole  world,  that 
a  freeman  contending  for  liberty  on  his  own  ground,  is  superior  to  any  slavish 
mercenary  on  earth. 

*  Liberty,  property,  life,  and  honor  are  all  at  stake  ;  upon  your  courage 
and  conduct  rest  the  hopes  of  our  bleeding  and  insulted  country  ;  our  wives, 
children,  and  parents  expect  safety  from  us  only ;  and  they  have  every  reason 
to  believe  that  Heaven  will  crown  with  success  so  just  a  cause. 

1  The  enemy  will  endeavor  to  intimidate  by  show  and  appearance ;  but 
remember  that  they  have  been  repulsed  on  various  occasions  by  a  few  brave 
Americans.  Their  cause  is  bad — their  men  are  conscious  of  it,  and,  if 
opposed  with  firmness  and  coolness  on  their  first  onset,  with  our  advantage 
of  works,  and  knowledge  of  the  ground,  the  victory  is  most  assuredly  ours. 
Every  good  soldier  will  be  silent  and  attentive — wait  for  orders — and  reserve 
his  fire  until  he  is  sure  of  doing  execution.' 

Before  day-break  on  the  morning  of  the  27th,  the  British  commanders 
brought  on  the  action.  Clinton  from  the  old  Jamaica  road  on  the  east, 
swept  down  on  Sullivan  while  he  was  desperately  struggling  with  De  Heistet. 
Grant,  from  the  Bay  of  New  York  on  the  west,  engaged  Stirling  among  the 
hills  where  Greenwood, — the  silent  city  of  the  dead, — now  stands,  and  whose 
soil  was  from  that  day  consecrated  by  the  most  generous  blood.  He  had 
also  to  contend  with  Cornwallis,  and  surrendered  only  after  a  hard-fought  but 
hopeless  battle,  many  of  his  fugitive  troops  being  swallowed  up  by  the  tide 
rushing  into  Gowanus  Creek.  After  a  hand-to-hand  fight  with  the  foe  in 
front  and  rear,  Sullivan  was  also  taken  prisoner  with  a  large  part  of  his 
division,  and  the  day  was  lost.1     '  At  this  moment  '—the  signal  for  a  general 

1  In  an  Oration  on  the  Life,  Character,  and  Pub-  '  But  General  Woodhull,  cut  off  in  the  position  ha 

lie   services  of  General  Nathaniel  Woodhull,  by  was  ordered  to  maintain,  from  the  soldiers  of  Congress, 

LutherR.  Marsh,  Esq.,  some  years  ago,  the  distin-  unaided,  alone,  fell  into  British  power.     Upon  being 

guished  lawyer  and  scholar,  after  tracing  the  career  of  commanded  to  say  "Cod  save  the  King/'  he  firmly 

the  Statesman  and   Soldier  who  had  fallen    into   the  refused,  but  replied  with  the  nobler  sentiment,  "  Goa 

hands  of  the  enemy  on  the  bloody  Long  Island  day,  save  us  ally     His  refusal  to  comply,*  brought  upon 

thus  he  speaks  of  his  death  and  cl  aracter  :—  him  the  savage  violence  of  his  captors.     But,  though 


3Q2  THE  RE TREA T  FROM  L ONG  ISLAND. 

attack — continues  Bancroft,  *  the  whole  force  of  the  Americans  on  Long 
Island  was  but  about  eight  thousand,  less  rather  than  more  ;  of  these  only 
about  four  thousand,  including  all  who  came  out  with  Stirling  and  Sullivan, 
were  on  the  wooded  passes  in  advance  of  the  Brooklyn  lines.  They  were 
environed  by  the  largest  British  army  which  appeared  in  the  field  during  the 
war.  Could  the  American  parties  have  acted  together,  the  disproportion 
would  yet  have  been  more  than  five  to  one  ;  but  as  they  were  disconnected, 
and  were  attacked  one  by  one,  and  were  routed  in  a  succession  of  skirmishes, 
the  disproportion  was  too  great  to  be  calculated.' 

The  Memorable  Retreat. — During  the  six  hours  the  battle  was  raging,  Wash 
ington  had  watched  it  from  New  York  with  intense  anguish,  but  to  have  left 
his  position  or  sent  further  reinforcements  might  have  proved  fatal.  The  loss 
was  afterwards  shown  by  Washington  to  have  been  somewhat  less  than  one 
thousand,  of  whom  three-fourths  were  prisoners ;  and  although  they  had  been 
so  well  drawn  off  that  they  succeeded  in  gaining  their  entrenchments,  yet  the 
victorious  enemy  felt  sure  of  their  capture,  which  should  end  the  war.  ,On 
the  morning  after  the  battle,  Washington  learned  that  the  British  would  delay 
a  further  attack  until  Howe's  fleet  could  move  up  the  East  River  to  co-ope- 
rate, which  would  give  him  a  day  for  planning  the  escape  of  his  army. 
During  the  morning  General  Mifflin  had  brought  over  a  reinforcement  of  a 
thousand  men,  whose  arrival  was  greeted  with  cheers.  This  raised  the 
number  of  Americans  to  nine  thousand,  and  served  effectually  to  conceal 
the  resolution  which  Washington  had  already  formed,  to  retreat  with  the 
whole  body.  In  Mifflin's  loyalty  and  discretion  he  could  place  absolute 
trust.  Through  him  he  sent  early  in  the  morning — August  29 — in  writ- 
ing, a  peremptory  command  to  Heath  at  King's  Bridge,  a  distance  of  fif- 
teen miles,  '  to  order  every  flat-bottomed  boat  and  other  craft  at  his  post,  fit 
for  transporting  troops,  down  to  New  York  as  soon  as  possible — without  any 
delay.'  Trumbull,  the  Commissary-General,  was  despatched  to  New  York 
1  to  impress  every  kind  of  water-craft,  on  either  side  of  the  river,  that  could  be 
kept  afloat,  and  had  either  oars  or  sails,  or  could  be  furnished  with  them,  and 
to  have  them  all  in  the  East  river  by  dark.'  Washington  had  now  been  forty, 
hours  in  the  saddle,  in  a  cold  drenching  rain ;  but  caring  little  for  rest  at 
any  time,  and  least  of  all  at  a  time  like  this,  he  was  riding  night  and  day  from 

defenceless,  assaulted  with  the  sword,  severely  wound-  wounded — thrown  with  eighty  of  his  countrymen  into 

ed  in  the  head,  and  with  an  arm  mangled  and  bleed-  one  of  those  terrible  prison  ships,  where  the  well  grew 

ing,  "  God  save  us  all,"  was  the  only  benediction  that  sick,  and  the  sick  died,  he  calmly  awaited  the  hour  of 

could  be  hacked  from  his  lips.     While  he  would  ac-  death.     At  last,  some  surgeon  or  other  told  him  that 

knowledge  no  kingly  monopoly  of  the  blessing  of  God,  this  hacked  arm  must  be  cut  off, — that  arm  which  he 

he  would   recognize  no    kingly  exclusion,  even  of  an  had  so   often  raised  in   debate,  and  in  battle  for  his 

enemy — "  God  save  us  all"  king  and  subject,  friend  country.     Before  the  amputation,  he  sent  for  his  wife, 

and  foe,  the  victor  and  the  vanquished,   the  prisoner  with  a  request  that  she  should  bring  with  her  all  the 

and  the  free,  the  living  and  the  dead.     "  God  save  us  money  she  had,  and  all  she  could  get.     The  dying 

all."    Here  was  a  breadth  of  philanthropy  which  knew  man  distributed  his  beneficence  among  his  fellow-sut- 

no  exception.     Here  was  the  teaching  of  our  Saviour  ferers,   embraced   his   wife,   uttered  a  prayer  for  his 

carried  into  practice.     Here  was  the  mingling  of  cour-  country,  and  died.     He  received  his  mortal  wound  in 

age,   patriotism  and  religion.     While  he  invoked  the  an  act  of  patriotism,  and  breathed  his  last  breath  in  an 

Divine  blessing  upon  all,  he  would  admit  neither  exclu-  act  of  charity.     His  death  was  in  keeping  with  his  life. 

sion  nor  exclusive  right — a  sublime  spectacle  !     He  He  who  would  die  for  a  principle,  might  be  expected  to 

would  not  yield  the  sentiment;  he  would  sooner  yield  use  his  last  hour  in   the  cause  of  human' ty.      "God 

his  life.     At  the  risk  of  death  he  clung  to  his  faith,  and  save  us  all," — a  motto  by  which  it  was  religious  to  live, 

gave  up  his  life  for  a  deathless  i  rinciple.     Mortally  and  glorious  to  die.' 


HOW  THE  RETREAT  WAS  CONDUCTED.  303 

station  to  station,  encouraging  his  worn,  half-clothed,  and  half-famished  men 
with  inspiring  words,  while  his  whole  bearing  betokened  the  unshaken  confi- 
dence of  an  undaunted  soul.  Later  in  the  day  he  called  a  council  of  war  at 
the  house  of  Philip  Livingston  on  Brooklyn  Heights,  and  opened  his  whole 
plan.  Some  fiery  spirits  declared  against  it.  But  Macdongall,  the  sailor, 
showed  that  '  they  were  liable  every  moment  on  a  change  of  wind,  to  have 
their  communication  with  New  York  cut  off  by  the  British  frigates.'  An 
eastern  storm  of  two  days  had  'injured  their  arms  and  spoiled  most  of  tiieir 
ammunition ;  the  soldiery,  of  whom  many  were  without  cover  at  night,  were 
worn  out  by  incessant  duties  and  watching.  The  resolution  to  retreat  was 
therefore  unanimous  ;  yet  in  ignorance  of  what  orders  Washington  had  issued, 
and  how  well  they  had  been  obeyed,  an  opinion  was  entertained  in  the  coun- 
cil that  success  was  not  to  be  hoped  for.' 

Some  time  after  dark  the  officers  of  every  regiment  were  ordered  to  hold 
their  entire  commands  ready  for  a  night  attack,  and  in  the  utmost  silence  the 
preparations  were  made  along  all  the  lines.  Every  man  of  the  nine  thousand 
seemed  to  feel  that  the  fate  of  the  next  few  hours  hung  upon  his  own  pru- 
dence and  valor.  Meanwhile  the  tiny  fleet  of  homely  craft  was  carefully 
manoeuvring  in  the  darkness  and  storm  and  raging  tide  of  the  East  river, 
waiting  for  the  concerted  signals.  The  preparations  were  conducted  with 
such  profound  secresy  that  no  suspicion  of  his  purpose  was  excited.  Not 
one  of  his  own  aids  was  in  his  confidence.  All  the  preparations  being  com- 
plete, at  nine  o'clock,  with  the  greatest  silence,  the  American  troops  began 
to  move  down  to  the  shore.  But  a  violent  northeast  wind  and  angry  tide 
rendered  all  attempts  to  cross  worse  than  futile.  .The  elements,  however, 
became  auspicious ;  for  while  the  anxious  host  could  see  no  deliverance  but 
in  the  miraculous  interposition  of  Heaven,  the  wind  suddenly  veered  to  the 
southwest,  '  the  water  became  so  smooth  that  the  row-boats  could  be  laden 
nearly  to  the  gunwales.  The  British  were  so  nigh  that  they  were  heard  with 
their  pickaxes  and  shovels ;  yet  neither  Agnew,  their  general  officer  for  the 
night,  nor  any  of  them,  took  notice  of  the  deep  murmur  in  the  camp,  or  the 
plash  of  oars  on  the  river,  or  the  ripple  under  the  sail-boats.  All  night  long, 
Washington  was  riding  through  the  camp,  insuring  the  regularity  of  every 
movement.  Some  time  before  dawn  on  Friday  morning,  Mifflin,  through  a 
mistake  of  orders,  began  to  march  the  covering  party  to  the  ferry :  it  was 
Washington  who  discovered  them  in  time  to  check  their  premature  withdraw- 
ing. The  order  to  resume  their  posts  was  a  trying  test  of  young  soldiers ; 
the  regiments  wheeled  about  with  precision,  and  recovered  their  former  sta- 
tion before  the  enemy  perceived  that  it  had  been  relinquished.  As  day 
approached,  the  sea-fog  came  rolling  in  thickly  from  the  ocean ;  welcomed  as 
a  heavenly  messenger,  it  shrouded  the  British  camp,  completely  hid  all  Brook- 
lyn, and  hung  over  the  East  river,  without  enveloping  New  York.  When 
after  three  hours  or  more  of  further  waiting,  and  after  every  other  regiment 
was  safely  cared  for,  the  covering  party  came  down  to  the  water-side,  Wash- 
ington remained  standing  on  the  ferry-stair,  and  would  not  be  persuaded  to 


3©4  DEATH  OF  HALE,   THE  AMERICAN  SPY.       ' 

enter  a  boat  till  they  were  embarked.'  '  As  the  sun  burst  forth  through  the 
fog,  Washington  landed  in  New  York,  and  the  wild,  prolonged  cheers  of  nine 
thousand  redeemed  men  greeted  him  as  the  deliverer  of  the  patriot  army,  and 
the  savior  of  his  country. 

The  retreat  of  Xenophon  with  his  ten  thousand  Greeks  is  enumerated 
among  signal  military  achievements.  It  found  its  parallel  in  Washington's 
retreat  from  Long  Island.  Compelled  thus  to  either  risk  the  safety  of  his 
entire  army  in  a  decisive  and  general  engagement,  or  to  abandon  New  York, 
Washington  prudently,  but  reluctantly,  withdrew  his  forces  from  the  city,  and 
posted  them  on  the  Heights  of  Harlem,  where  he  made  his  position  as  strong 
as  possible,  and  began  to  prepare  for  a  long,  arduous,  and  inevitable  campaign. 

Death  of  Captain  Nathaniel  Hale  the  American  Spy. — It  now  became  ne- 
cessary to  obtain  information  of  the  strength,  situation,  and  plans  of  the  enemy. 
Colonel  Knowlton,  to  whom  Washington  had  spoken,  mentioned  the  matter  to 
Captain  Hale,  one  of  the  most  brilliant  and  best  educated  young  men  in  the 
army.  He  had  left  Yale  College  to  dedicate  himself  to  the  cause  of  liberty. 
He  immediately  volunteered  his  services,  and  conquering  his  repugnance  to 
assume  a  character  foreign  to  his  nature,  in  the  hope  of  being  useful  to  his 
country,  he  passed  in  disguise  to  Long  Island,  and  obtained  the  requisite  in- 
formation. In  attempting  to  return,  however,  he  was  apprehended,  and 
brought  before  the  British  commander  who  ordered  him  to  be  executed  the 
next  morning.  The  sentence  was  conformable  to  the  laws  of  war  j  but  it 
was  carried  into  effect  in  the  most  brutal  manner.  He  asked  if  he  might  see 
a  friend  whom  he  loved  better  than  his  own  life ;  it  was  denied.  He  asked 
for  a  Bible  with  which  he  might  await  death  ;  it  was  refused.  He  desired  that 
a  clergyman  might  be  with  him  ;  but  'even  this  request  which  all  governments 
and  civilized  men  hold  in  respect,  was  also  refused.  More  cruel  still,  his 
letters  written  the  night  before  his  death,  to  his  betrothed,  his  mother,  and 
other  friends,  and  committed  to  the  British  commander,  with  the  request  that 
they  might  be  sent  to  their  destination  after  his  execution,  were  broken  open, 
read,  and  burned,  'in  order,'  as  was  said  by  the  provost-marshal,  '  that  the 
rebels  should  not  know  that  they  had  a  man  in  their  army  who  could  die  so 
heroic  a  death.'  When  young  Hale  was  led  out  to  execution,  he  said  with 
calmness,  as  a  defiant  expression  of  exultation  wreathed  his  face,  j  I  lament 
that  I  have  but  one  life  to  lay  down  for  my  country.'  a 

Howe  Proposes  a  Conference  with  a  View  to  Peace. — Believing  that  the 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  103-4.  He  also  adds  : — It  were  on  Long  Island,  with  their  provisions,  military 
was  seven  o'clock  before  all  the  companies  reached  the  stores,  field  artillery,  and  ordnance,  except  a  few 
New  York  side.  At  four,  Montresor  had  given  the  worthless  iron  cannon,  landed  safely  in  New  York, 
alarm  that  the  Americans  were  in  full  retreat;  but  the  'Considering  the  difficulties,'  wrote  Greene,  'the  re- 
English  officers  were  sluggards,  and  some  hours  elaps-  treat  from  Long  Island  was  the  best  effected  retreat 
ed  before  he  and  a  corporal,  with  six  men,  clambered  I  ever  read  or  heard  of.' 
through  the  fallen  trees,  and  entered  the  works,  only 

to  find  them  evacuated.     From  Brooklyn  Heights  four  2  His  body  was  buried  beneath    the    gibbet-tree, 

boats  were  still  to  be  seen  through  the  lifting  fog  on  The   name    of  this    youthful    patriot  martyr,  appears 

the  East  river  ;  three  of  them  filled  with  troops,  were  luminous  upon  the  pages  of  our  country's  history,  and 

half  way  over,  and  escaped  ;  the  fourth,  manned  by  the  grateful    citizens  of   his   native    town — Covenfr-y, 

three  vagabonds,  who  had  loitered  behind  to  plunder,  Conn. — have  erected  a    handsome    monument  to  nis 

was  taken;  otherwise  the  whole  nine  thousand,  who  memory  there. — Lossing's  Fi'.ld-Book,  vol.  ii.,  p.  €09. 


RESULTS  OF  THE  BROOKLYN  DISASTER.  305 

disaster  of  Long  Island  would  dispose  the  revolutionists  to  listen  to  almost 
any  overture  for  reconciliation,  the  British  commander  paroled  General  Sulli- 
van, who  passed  through  the  lines  with  a  verbal  communication  to  Congress, 
suggesting  a  committee  of  conference,  and  Dr.  Franklin,  Edward  Rutledge, 
and  John  Adams  were  appointed  Special  Commissioners.  The  place  of 
meeting  was  on  Staten  Island,  opposite  Perth  Amboy,  and  the  time,  the  nth 
of  September.  The  interview  was  not  a  long  one.  To  the  amazement  of 
Lord  Howe,  the  Americans  would  treat  only  on  the  basis  of  a  recognition  of 
their  independence.  The  British  General,  assuming  the  helplessness  of  their 
position,  and  the  hopelessness  of  their  cause,  proffered  his  patronage  and 
protection.  With  the  courtesy  which  always  marked  the  manner  of  Franklin, 
he  thanked  his  lordship  for  his  good  intentions ;  but  he  assured  him  that  they 
proposed  to  dispense  with  any  further  patronage  from  his  majesty;  and  as  for 
his  protection,  they  considered  that  they  were  able  to  protect  themselves.  The 
conference  was  soon  brought  to  a  close,  the  Commissioners  returning  to 
Philadelphia,  and  Howe  to  his  headquarters,  both  parties  more  resolute  than 
ever  to  prosecute  the  war.  The  following  day,  September  12th,  the  British 
army  entered  New  York,  and  held  it  till  Independence  had  conquered  a  peace. 

Consequences  of  the  Long  Island  Disaster. — The  recent  defeat  had  spread 
gloom  through  the  country.  There  are  few  instances  on  record,  in  which  na- 
tions have  gone  into  any  great  enterprise  with  a  stronger  reliance  upon  Heaven, 
or  a  firmer  conviction  of  the  justice  of  their  cause.  In  fact,  so  many  eloquent 
and  stirring  appeals  had  been  made  to  the  people,  by  the  newspapers,  and 
by  the  clergy  of  every  denomination,  that  nobody  seemed  to  dream  of  the 
possibility  of  defeat,  except  the  military  leaders.  The  high  hopes  with  which 
the  beginning  of  the  struggle  was  greeted,  now  gave  way  to  an  unreasonable 
depression,  and  every  man  in  the  American  army  who  had  left  behind  him  a 
home  which  he  had  reclaimed  from  the  wilderness,  with  wife  and  children  to 
protect  from  the  ferocious  cruelties  practised  by  the  British  and  German 
soldiery,  felt  that  the  time  had  come  for  him  to  hasten  back,  and  stand  senti- 
nel by  those  he  loved.  Entire  regiments  of  militia  deserted,  and  the  regular 
army  itself  was  being  thinned  every  day  from  the  same  cause.  Its  entire  dis- 
solution seemed  inevitable.  A  survey  of  its  condition  would  have  disheart- 
ened almost  any  other  commander.  All  the  writers  and  authorities  of  the 
time  tell  the  same  depressing  story.  Insubordination  pervaded  the  ranks. 
The  spirit  of  union  and  patriotism  which  had  so  suddenly  clustered  an  army 
around  Bunker  Hill,  and  achieved  such  great  results  on  that  memorable  day, 
had  disappeared :  and  although  that  battle  had  been  fought  with  little  order 
or  system,  and  it  was  neither  known  on  the  field,  nor  for  years  afterwards,  who 
was  the  commander-in-chief,1  yet  so  indomitable  was  the  courage,  and  so 
completely  had  a  common  feeling  blended  the  raw  masses  together,  that  all  the 

1  President  John  Adams,  in  a  letter  June  19th,  1818,  setts,    but    Pomeroy    was    certainly    his    superior    iu 

in  answer  to  the  inquiry,  'who  was  the   first   officer  of  command.'        In  this  same  letter  he  continues  :    4The 

Massachusetts  at  Bunker  Hill  or  Breed's  Hill?'  says,  army  at    Cambridge   was   not    a   national    army,  for 

'  I  have  always  understood  he  was  Colonel  Pomeroy  or  there  was   no  nation.      It  was  not    an  United  States 

General  Pomeroy.      Colonel     Prescott  might    be  the  army,    for  there   were     no    United     States.      It   was 

most  persevering,  and  efficacious  officer  in  Massachu-  not  an  army  of  the  United  Colonies,  for  it  could   not 
20 


306  DISCOURAGING  CONDITION  OF  THE  ARMY. 

fruits  of  a  great  victory  had  been  reaped.  That  battle  had  meant  the  people 
of  New  England  in  arms.  Fifteen  months  had  gone  by,  and  in  no  sense  was 
the  army  now  a  homogeneous  body.  The  remnants  of  Bunker  Hill  still  con- 
stituted the  nucleus  of  the  National  force  that  was  to  fight  our  battles  ;  but 
having  been  reinforced  by  troops  from  New  York,  New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania. 
Delaware,  Maryland  and  Virginia,  the  jealousy  of  their  claims  to  precedence 
strengthened  by  sectional  differences,  and  the  men  vitiated  by  those  vices  which 
desultory  warfare  always  engenders,  rendered  what  was  numerous  on  the  roll- 
call,  the  least  effective,  and  the  least  reliable  of  any  army  Washington  ever 
commanded.  Washington's  letter  to  Congress — September  24th — discloses 
only  in  part  the  actual  state  of  things,  for  it  was  too  bad  to  be  made  publicly 
known.  In  a  general  return  of  fifteen  regiments,  there  appear  to  have  been 
in  the  surgeon's  department,  instruments  sufficient  for  only  a  single  battalion  ; 
and  besides  those  sick  from  other  causes,  several  hundred  men  lay  wounded 
in  the  hospitals.  There  was  no  immediate  lack  of  food,  but  there  was  a  lack 
of  everything  else.  Proof  enough  exists,  that  at  no  period  during  the  Revo- 
lution, did  so  many  causes  conspire  to  depress  the  spirits  of  the  commander- 
in-chief,  and  his  most  trusted  generals. 

Washington  had  closed  his  letter  to  Congress  with  an  urgent  appeal,  to 
the  effect  that,  he  could  entertain  no  reasonable  hope  of  successfully  con- 
tending with  the  public  enemy,  unless  he  could  be  furnished  with  an  effective 
army,  enlisted  for  the  entire  war.  Congress  acted  at  once,  and  bounties  were 
offered  for  all  who  would  enlist,  with  the  pledge  of  portions  of  the  public 
domain,  in  addition  to  the  regular  pay  of  the  service.  This,  in  the  end,  was 
to  produce  the  desired  result.  But  in  the  meantime,  how  many  obstacles 
had  to  be  overcome,  and  how  many  misgivings  and  solicitudes  had  to  be  suf- 
fered by  the  Leader  of  the  Revolution,  and  his  immediate  associates,  we 
of  the  present  day  cannot  comprehend.  Had  the  actual  condition  of  both 
armies  been  known  at  that  time  to  the  whole  country,  one  of  two  results 
would  have  followed :  either  the  patriotism  of  the  nation  would  have 
risen  in  a  tempest,  and  swept  the  British  army  into  the  sea,  or  our  troops 
would  have  disbanded,  and  the  country  fallen  an  easy  prey  to  the  conquerors. 
A  council  of  war  was  summoned,  and  it  was  determined  that  the  army  should 
be  withdrawn  from  New  York,  the  military  stores  removed  to  Dobb's  Ferry, 
twenty-two  miles  up  the  Hudson,  while  the  chief  body  of  the  forces  was  to 
fall  back  on  Harlem  Heights,  which  stretch  from  the  plain  seven  miles  above 
the  City  Hall,  to  206th  Street,  near  King's  Bridge  at  the  end  of  Manhattan 
Island,  and  now  the  upper  limit  of  the  city.  This  plan  was  at  once  carried 
into  execution,  with  the  enemy  pressing  hard  in  the  rear.1 

be  said  in  any  sense,  that  the  Colonies  were  united,  and  imprisoned  the  British  army  in  Boston.      But  who 

The  centre  of  their  union,  the  Congress  of  Philadelphia,  was  the  sovereign  of  this  united,  or  rather  congregated 

had  not  adopted  or  acknowledged   the  army  at  Cam-  army,  and  who  its  commander-in-chief?      It  had  none, 

bridge.     It  was  not   a  New   England  army,  for  New  Putnam,   Pomeroy  and  Green,  were  as  independent  of 

England  had  not  associated.      New  England  had  no  Ward,  as  Ward  was  of  them.' — Frothingham's  Siege  of 

legal  legislature,  nor  any  common  executive  authority,  Boston,  p.  173. 

even  upon  the  principles  of  original  authority,  or  even  '  He — Major  Aaron  Burr — served  as  aid-de-camp 

of  oiaginal  power  in  the  people.      Massachusetts  had  to   General   Putnam  in    the  unfortunate   action    upon 

her  army  ;  New   Hampshire   her  army  ;    and   Rhode  Long  Island,  and  upon  the  subsequent  evacuation  oi 

Island  her  wmy,    These  four  armies  met  at  Cambridge,  New  York  saved  a  brigade,  which  had  been  detained 


CONTRAST  BETWEEN  THE    CONTENDING  PARTIES.      307 

A  strong  detachment  of  the  British  formed  a  line  from  34th  Street  on  the 
East  River,  across  to  the  Hudson,  two  miles  below  the  American  intrench- 
ments  ;  while  their  main  army  stretched  from  Brooklyn  to  Flushing,  and  the 
British  commander  with  an  overwhelming  force  was  preparing  to  close 
around  the  Revolutionary  army  and  compel  it  to  accept  a  general  engagement, 
or  escape  annihilation  in  flight. 

The  Contrast  between  the  Contending  Parties. — It  was  a  strange  spectacle 
now  presented  to  the  world,  even  if  we  contemplate  it  only  in  a  military 
point  of  view.  The  King  of  England  had  an  efficient  navy,  with  which 
his  troops  could  be  transported  from  any  point  to  any  other  along  our 
entire  coast  from  Maine  to  Georgia ; — while  in  no  instance  could  our  own 
forces  change  their  position,  except  by  land  marches.  Great  Britain  also 
had  nearly  forty  thousand  perfectly  armed,  and  thoroughly  disciplined 
men,  commanded  by  officers  of  great  experience,  all  of  whom  were  fired 
by  the  ambition  of  winning  in  this  distant  field  of  adventure,  laurels 
which  they  might  wear  with  honor  after  their  return  to  their  native  shores. 
At  no  moment  during  the  Revolution  did  the  British  commanders  lack 
money,  munitions,  or  men.  They  had  every  appliance — the  Revolutionists 
few — generally  none.  They  were  obliged  to  create  resources  to  meet  every 
exigency  ;  and  make  up  for  order,  discipline,  munitions,  means  of  transport, 
and  all  the  other  facilities  which  were  at  the  immediate  command  of  their 
enemy,  by  an  undying  and  unconquerable  determination  to  achieve  their  inde- 
pendence. Washington  never  had  one-half  so  many  men  under  his  com- 
mand— except  at  a  later  period — as  the  enemy  could  bring  into  the  field. 
He  had  either  to  peril  the  national  cause  in  the  hazards  of  one  or  more  great 
battles,  or  to  adopt  the  policy  of  Fabius  Maximus,  who  saved  Italy  twenty 
centuries  before,  by  evading  decisive  engagements  with  the  irresistible  hosts 
of  Hannibal.  He  has  been  called  the  American  Fabius,  because  he  wasted 
away  the  strength  of  the  enemy  by  the  exhausting  attrition  of  harassment  and 
delay.  This  policy  was  early  adopted,  and  rigidly  adhered  to  through  the 
war.  It  was  the  only  policy  that  could  have  saved  us.  Among  other  benefi- 
cent results  that  sprang  from  it,  was  the  impression  which  the  British  com- 
manders got,  that  after  being  worsted  for  a  few  times,  the  panic-struck  Ameri- 
cans would  yield  to  the  arms  of  Britain.  Washington  was  aware  of  this,  and 
took  advantage  of  it,  as  we  shall  soon  find  from  events  that  transpired  in 
New  Jersey,  where  his  movements  on  the  banks  of  the  Delaware  were  as 
daring  and  rapid,  as  Napoleon's  on  the  plains  of  Italy. 

17te  Struggle  East  of  the  Hudson. — The  Continental  army  had  taken 
refuge  behind  their  hastily  thrown-up  entrenchments  on  the  heights  above 
Harlem,  and  a  strong  detachment  was  sent  to  dislodge  them.     But  the  British 

there  too  long,  from  falling  into  the  hands  of  the  Brit-  from  the  service,  which  happened  in  1779,  though  not 

ish.      These    services   earned    for  him  a  lieutenant-  again  in  action,  he  appears  to  have  persevered  in  the 

colonel's  commission,   and  the  virtual  command  of  a  faithful    and    punctual    performance  of  the  duties  in- 

regimcnt.    He  had  a  horse  shot  under  him  at  the  battle  cumbent  upon  a  skilful  and    vigilant    officer.—  North 

ofMonmjuth,  and  from  that  time  until -his  retirement  American  Revitw,  July,  1839,  p.  167. 


308  LAST  FOUR  DARK  MONTHS   OF   1776. 

veterans  were  so  effectually  repulsed  after  a  fierce  skirmish,  that  they  were  glad 
to  draw  off  their  shattered  battalions ;  and  when  Howe  was  ieady  with  a  heavier 
force  for  a  decisive  engagement,  he  found  the  victorious  and  now  inspirited 
patriots,  prepared  to  defy  him  behind  a  double  line  of  works  which  had  been 
thrown  up,  with  the  celerity  that  marked  Washington's  action  in  every  mo- 
ment of  exigency.  The  attack  could  be  risked  only  by  a  flank  movement ; 
nor  even  thus,  without  more  formidable  preparations.  War  vessels  were  sent 
up  the  Hudson  and  East  rivers,  and  with  every  means  at  his  disposal,  it  seemed 
to  the  British  general  an  easy  matter  to  surround  the  American  army,  and  by 
cutting  off  all  means  of  escape,  force  a  choice  between  a  general  engagement 
against  fearful  odds,  and  the  certain  fate  of  annihilation  by  piecemeal,  in  a 
series  of  hopeless  encounters.  In  any  event,  Cornwallis  made  sure  of  pre- 
venting Washington's  escape  to  New  Jersey,  in  which  case,  the  Congress  of  the 
Rebels  in  Philadelphia  would  be  left  at  Lord  Howe's  mercy.  But  the  British 
generals  knew  little  of  the  man  they  were  dealing  with,  nor  by  what  scale 
the  comparative  power  of  the  contending  forces  was  in  the  long  run  to  be 
measured. 

The  last  four  Months  of  the  dark  Year  of  1776. — Although  it  may  not  be 
the  commonly  accepted  view,  yet,  I  am  inclined  to  think,  that  the  entire  fate 
of  the  War  for  Independence,  hung  upon  the  four  months  which  began  with 
the  disastrous  defeat  of  Long  Island  before  the  night  of  August  27th — and 
ended  in  the  victory  of  Trenton  on  the  morning  after  Christmas — December 
26th.  The  first  event  shrouded  the  nation  as  if  with  the  pall  of  death  :  the 
last  came  over  her  like  a  resurrection  morning.  Even  a  hurried  relation  of 
the  exciting  events  which  marked  that  interval,  may  impart  some  color  of 
plausibility  to  this  opinion.  Garrisoning  Fort  Washington, — the  highest 
ground  on  Manhattan  Island,  and  which  overlooks  a  wide  sweep  of  land  and 
water — the  patriot  commander  withdrew  the  rest  of  his  army  to  the  Bronx 
river,  a  few  miles  to  the  northeast  in  Westchester  county,  and  established 
his  headquarters  still  further  northward,  at  the  village  of  White  Plains.  Here 
he  was  obliged  to  accept  battle  on  the  28th  of  October.  Retiring  once  more, 
before  a  superior  force,  after  a  severe  engagement,  he  fell  back  five  miles, 
three  days  afterwards — November  1st — to  the  hills  of  North  Castle  and 
formed  a  strong  camp  which  the  enemy  was  not  inclined  to  disturb. 

Fall  of  Fort  Washington. — Four  days  later,  a  force  of  five  thousand  com- 
pletely equipped  men,  under  General  Knyphausen,  consisting  chiefly  of  Hes- 
sians, who  had  recently  landed  and  joined  the  British  army  in  Westchester, 
prepared  to  carry  Fort  Washington  by  storm,  if  it  could  be  gained  in  no 
other  way.  This  fort  had  been  raised  by  General  Putnam.  Its  highest  peak 
rises  nearly  two  hundred  and  fifty  feet  over  the  eastern  bank  of  the  Hudson, 
and  its  summit  was  crowned  with  a  five-sided  earthwork,  mounting  thirty-four 
cannon,  but  destitute  of  casemates,  or  formidable  outposts.  In  occupying 
Harlem  Heights  for  three  weeks  with  his  main  force,  Washington's  twofold 


TRYING  POSITION  OF   WASHINGTON.  309 

object  was  to  arrest  Howe's  advance  to  the  north,  and  gain  men  and  muni- 
tions  to  be  able  to  cope  with  the  enemy. 

Trying  Position  of  Washington. — The  adoption  of  the  Declaration  of  In- 
dependence, had  relieved  the  public  mind  from  its  chief  political  solicitude, 
since  the  belief  was  generally  entertained  that  the  act  was  irrevocable.  In 
pursuance  of  the  recommendation  of  Congress,  the  several  States  began  tc 
mould  their  new  governments  on  a  permanent  basis,  in  harmony  with  the 
spirit  of  a  national  union,  and  with  all  the  guarantees  of  sovereignty  in  their  in- 
dividual capacity  as  Republican  Commonwealths.  Many  of  the  strongest  men 
in  Congress,  among  them  Thomas  Jefferson,  were  called  home  to  assist  in 
this  important  work  of  State  building,  and  a  less  enthusiastic  and  determined 
spirit  was  manifest  in  the  national  councils.  The  late  disasters  to  our  arms 
had  dampened  the  patriotic  ardor  of  the  country,  and  little  attention  was  paid 
to  the  representations  which  Washington  was  pressing  upon  Congress,  with  so 
much  earnestness,  and  such  frequent  repetitions.  Of  the  actual  condition  of 
the  army,  and  the  urgent  necessity  of  adopting  the  most  vigorous  measures 
for  its  permanent  equipment  and  consolidation,  Congress  had  no  adequate 
conception.  Least  of  all  were  they  aware  of  one  imminent  peril  which  was 
threatening  from  another  quarter.  Thus  far,  Washington  was  commander-in- 
chief  only  in  name,  for  he  was  clothed  with  none  of  the  attributes  of  an  abso- 
lute command.  The  authorities  of  the  different  States  retained  the  power  of 
appointing  all  the  officers  of  the  troops  they  raised,  and  determining  to  a  great 
extent,  their  destination  when  they  took  the  field.  The  terms  of  enlistment 
were  too  brief  to  admit  of  discipline ;  questions  of  rank  and  precedence 
were  continually  arising;  and  no  vigorous  means  were  devised  to  arm,  or  suffi- 
ciently equip  a  force  able  to  resist  the  first  onset  of  a  single  hostile  division. 

During  these  dark  days  of  peril,  when  there  was  no  safety  but  in  retreat 
from  a  foe  too  mighty  to  grapple  with,  there  was  one  danger  which  confronted 
Washington  far  more  to  be  dreaded,  and  it  was  harder  to  bear,  because  either 
to  expose  it,  or  retire  from  the  army,  would  have  proved  fatal  to  the  cause 
which  to  him  was  fai  dearer  than  life. 

Charles  Lee  was  a  bad  Man,  and  Washington  knew  it. — His  character  is 
faithfully  drawn  by  Bancroft:  "With  all  his  ill-concealed  aspirations,  he  had 
not  one  talent  of  a  commander.  He  was  proud  of  being  an  Englishman,  and 
affected,  by  the  right  of  birth,  to  look  down  upon  his  present  associates, 
whom  he  thought  to  be  '  very  bad  company ; '  for  he  had  the  national  pride 
of  his  countrymen,  though  not  their  loyalty;  the  disdain  of  other  nations, 
without  devotedness  to  his  own.  His  alienation  from  Britain  grew  out  of 
petulance  at  being  neglected  ;  and  had  a  chance  of  favor  been  thrown  to  him, 
no  one  would  have  snapped  more  swiftly  at  the  bait.  He  esteemed  the 
people  into  whose  service  he  had  entered  as  unworthy  of  a  place  among  the 
nations;  their  Declaration  of  Independence  jarred  on  his  feelings;  and  if  by 
fits  he  played  the  zealot  in  their  cause,  his  mind,  after  every  swing,  came  back 


3i°  BAD    CHARACTER    OF   GENERAL   LEE. 

to  his  first  idea,  that  they  had  only  to  consider  how  they  could  'with  safety, 
glory,  and  advantage,  return  to  their  former  state  of  relation.'  He  used  after- 
wards to  say,  that  'things  never  would  have  gone  so  far,  had  his  advice  been 
taken  j '  and  he  reconciled  himself  to  the  Declaration  of  Independence  by 
the  Americans,  only  that  he  might  have  something  'to  cede'  as  the  price  of 
'accommodation.'  On  the  seventh  of  October,  Lee  appeared  before  the 
Continental  Congress  in  Philadelphia,  and  obtained  the  coveted  grant  of 
thirty  thousand  dollars  as  an  indemnity  against  apprehended  losses  in 
England.  Aware  of  his  designation  to  the  chief  command  in  case  of 
a  vacancy,  he  looked  upon  himself  as  already  the  head  of  a  party,  fretted 
more  than  ever  at  his  subordinate  position,  and  wearied  Congress  with 
clamor  for  a  separate  army  on  the  Delaware ;  but  they  proved  deaf  to 
his  cries,  and  sent  him  to  the  camp  of  Washington,  while  he  in  return 
secretly  mocked  at  them  as  '  a  stable  of  cattle  that  stumbled  at  every  step.' " 
And  yet  his  manner  was  so  captivating,  his  plans  so  plausible,  his  manage- 
ment so  adroit,  he  swayed  an  influence  so  strong  over  a  considerable  party, 
especially  among  the  timid,  the  halting,  the  lukewarm  and  the  compromising, 
that  Washington  was  obliged  to  tolerate  him,  although  his  keen  perception  of 
character  penetrated  through  the  illusive  gauze  which  hid  from  dimmer  eyes 
the  real  motives  of  the  charlatan.  He  understood  Lee  better  than  Lee  un- 
derstood himself,  and  not  long  afterwards  the  country  was  to  discover  how 
often  it  was  wrong,  and  how  often  the  leader  was  right.  Meantime  the  mis- 
chief this  man  was  to  do,  was  incalculable.  Contrary  to  the  opinion  of  Putnam 
and  Greene,  and  especially  of  Lee,  that  Howe  had  no  intention  of  attacking 
Fort  Washington,  and  in  compliance  with  the  orders  of  Congress  to  hold  that 
post  to  the  last  extremity,  Washington  called  a  council  of  war — November  6-— 
and  at  the  same  time  wrote  a  pressing  letter  to  Congress  to  reverse  the  order. 
He  spoke  of  'the  approaching  dissolution  of  his  army  from  the  expiration  of  the 
terms  of  enlistment,'  and  assured  that  body,  '  that  the  enemy  would  bend 
their  force  against  Fort  Washington,  and  invest  it  immediately.'  But  the 
order  was  not  revoked ;  and  worse  than  all,  Greene,  the  ablest  and  best  of 
his  Generals,  was  'possessed  with  the  same  infatuation.'  The  event  was 
soon  to  show  whose  eyes  saw  clearest.  But  for  his  scrupulous  respect 
for  the  supreme  civil  power  at  Philadelphia,  the  approaching  disaster  would 
have  been  averted  by  Washington's  peremptory  order  to  evacuate  a  post 
which,  even  if  it  could  be  held,  would  have  now  been  of  little  advantage.  As  it 
was,  he  did  his  best  to  save  the  Fort  Washington  garrison,  and  the  stores  at 
Fort  Lee.  On  the  eighth  he  gave  his  final  instructions  to  Greene,  which 
left  him  discretion  to  save  himself  and  his  garrison,  if  he  chose  to  act  on  the 
judgment  of  his  chief.  '  The  passage,'  he  said,  '  of  three  vessels  up  the  North 
river  is  so  plain  a  proof  of  the  insufficiency  of  all  the  obstructions  thrown 
into  it,  that  it  will  fully  justify  a  change  of  the  disposition.  If  we  cannot 
prevent  vessels  from  passing  up,  and  the  enemy  are  possessed  of  the  sur- 
rounding country,  what  valuable  purpose  can  it  answer  to  attempt  to  hold  a 
post,  from  which  the  expected  benefit  cannot  be  had  ?     I  am,  therefore,  in- 


WASHINGTON  CROSSES  THE  HUDSON.  311 

clined  to  think  that  it  will  not  be  prudent  to  hazard  the  men  and  stores  at 
Mount  Washington ;  but  as  you  are  on  the  spot,  I  leave  it  to  you  to  give  such 
orders  as  to  evacuating  Mount  Washington,  as  you  may  judge  best :  but  so 
far  as  can  be  collected  from  various  sources  of  intelligence,  the  enemy  must 
design  a  penetration  into  Jersey,  a?id  to  fall  upon  your  post.  You  will,  there- 
fore,  immediately  have  all  the  stores  removed,  which  you  do  not  deem  necessary 
for  your  defe?ice.}  This  advice  would  have  saved  the  lives  of  a  hundred  and 
fifty  brave  men,  the  worse  than  death  on  board  prison-ships  of  nearly  two  thou- 
sand others,  the  disgraceful  flight  of  Congress  to  Baltimore,  and  the  almost 
utter  dissolution  of  the  patriot  army. 

Washington  crosses  the  Hudson  into  New  Jersey,  Nov.  12. — Having  thus 
done  his  best  to  avert  the  disaster  he  so  clearly  foresaw,  and  knowing  that 
Howe's  grand  object  was  to  reach  Philadelphia  before  it  could  be  protected, 
Washington  determined  to  make  New  Jersey  the  battle-ground  of  a  decisive 
campaign,  and  leaving  a  force  sufficient  to  hold  North  Castle,  he  marched  to 
the  Hudson.  After  halting  long  enough  at  Peekskill — a  village  on  the  east 
bank  at  the  lower  entrance  to  the  Highlands — he  crossed  the  river  with  his 
main  body,  to  Fort  Lee,  on  the  Jersey  shore,  two  miles  below  Fort  Washing- 
ton. Here  he  learned  the  depressing  tidings,  that  Greene  had  not  only  utterly 
disregarded  his  instructions,  but  written  to  Congress  encouraging  its  members 
to  believe  that  Howe  would  be  powerless  to  take  Fort  Washington,  even  if  he 
should  have  any  idea  of  attempting  it.  Washington's  apprehensions  were 
soon  realized.  Three  days  later,  thirty  flat-boats  passed  the  post  undis- 
covered, and  landed  a  force  at  Spuyten  Duyvel  creek.  Having  fortified  his 
position  on  Fordham  Heights,  Howe  peremptorily  demanded  '  the  surrender 
of  Fort  Washington,  on  pain  of  the  garrison  being  put  to  the  sword.'  Colonel 
Magaw  replied  that,  in  spite  of  the  inhumanity  of  the  threat,  he  should  defend 
his  post  to  the  last  extremity,  and  at  once  informed  General  Greene,  who 
sent  a  messenger  with  the  intelligence  to  Washington,  who  had  advanced  on 
to  Hackensack.  Springing  to  saddle,  Washington  rode  to  Fort  Lee,  and 
while  crossing  the  river  at  midnight  in  a  row-boat,  was  met  by  Putnam  and 
Greene.  The  latter  assured  him  that  he  had  put  ■  men  enough  into  Fort 
Washington  to  hold  their  own  against  the  whole  'British  army,'  that  'the  gar- 
rison was  in  high  spirits,  and  all  would  be  well.'  Washington  could  not  close 
his  eyes  to  the  certain  fate  which  awaited  the  garrison. 

A  brave  Defence  and  a  fatal  Blunder. — If  the  fort  itself  had  been  alone  to 
be  defended,  the  British  victory  would  have  been  purchased  at  an  enormous 
cost.  But  a  vastly  greater  task  was  committed  to  Colonel  Magaw,  its  com- 
mander. He  was  ordered  to  defend  'the  grounds  from  the  hills  above 
Tubby-hook  to  a  zigzag  line  a  little  south  of  the  present  Trinity  cemetery,  a 
distance  north  and  south  of  two  and  a  half  miles,  a  circuit  of  six  or  seven.' 
This  compelled  him  to  scatter  his  force.  A  Maryland  rifle  regiment  was 
stationed  at  the  northern  point  of  the  heights,  a  Pennsylvanian  at  the  southern, 


312  FALL  OF  FORT  WASHINGTON— TERRIBLE  LOSS. 

and  another  on  the  east  side  towards  Harlem,  while  Magaw  held  the  fott 
himself.  Four  separate  attacks  were  made  from  as  many  directions ;  the 
most  perilous  and  formidable,  by  two  brigades  under  Rail  and  Knyphausen, 
numbering  forty-five  hundred  veteran  Hessians.  Against  rocks,  felled  trees,  and 
a  murderous  fire  of  rifles,  the  men  pressed  gallantly  up  the  steeps,  from  the 
river-side,  led  by  their  desperate  commanders,  whose  cheers  rang  out  loud  and 
clear  over  the  firing  of  the  garrison,  and  the  answering  shouts  of  the  clam- 
bering assailants.  The  last  obstruction  was  finally  scaled,  and  the  two  parties 
came  together  in  a  hand-to-hand  grapple.  Lord  Cornwallis,  with  his  brigade, 
had,  at  about  the  same  time,  climbed  Laurel  Hill,  and  stormed  and  carried 
the  battery  over  the  dying  body  of  Baxter,  its  commander.  On  the  south, 
Percy  gained  a  strong  and  sheltered  position,  from  which  he  sent  to  Howe  for 
reinforcements.  They  were  instantly  despatched,  and  with  a  greatly  superior 
force  they  made  an  irresistible  onset.  On  all  sides  the  patriots  were  out- 
numbered— in  several  of  the  fiercest  combats,  five  to  one.  Watching  these 
terrible  struggles  from  Fort  Lee,  and  waiting  for  messages  to  bring  tidings  of 
the  fortune  of  the  day,  Washington  at  last  sent  a  despatch  to  Magaw,  telling 
him  he  would  try  to  bring  offhis  garrison  if  he  could  hold  out  till  night.  But  the 
truce  of  half  an  hour  for  a  parley,  which  was  all  Magaw  could  get,  had  expired, 
and  the  brave,  but  helpless  commander  was  obliged  to  capitulate.  Every- 
where the  tide  of  battle  went  against  the  Americans.  There  was  no  choice 
but  surrender  or  death.  The  loss  of  the  enemy  in  killed  and  wounded — that 
of  the  Germans  numbering  more  than  three  hundred  and  fifty,  and  of  th*^ 
whole  British  army  upwards  of  five  hundred — showed  how  well  the  battle  had 
been  contested :  for  the  fallen  or  disabled  Americans  on  the  field,  were  only 
one  hundred  and  fifty.  But  this  gives  no  idea  of  the  extent  of  the  disaster. 
It  is  summed  up  only  in  part,  by  reckoning  on  the  scroll  of  captives,  twenty- 
six  hundred  men,  '  of  whom  one-half  were  well-trained  soldiers,'  with  some  of 
the  finest  artillery  and  arms  in  the  service.  '*  Greene  would  never  assume  his 
share  of  responsibility  for  the  disaster,  and  would  never  confess  his  glaring 
errors  of  judgment ;  but  wrongfully  ascribed  the  defeat  to  a  panic  which  had 
struck  the  men,  so  that  '  they  fell  a  prey  to  their  own  fears.'  The  grief  of 
Washington  was  sharpened  by  self-reproach  for  having  yielded  his  own 
opinion  and  wish  to  the  confident  reports  of  the  commander  of  the  post,  who 
had  incomparably  better  opportunities  than  himself  of  forming  a  just  judg- 
ment ;  but  he  took  the  teachings  of  adversity  without  imbibing  its  bitterness ; 
he  never  excused  himself  before  the  world  by  throwing  the  blame  on  another; 
he  never  suffered  his  opinion  of  Greene  to  be  confused ;  and  he  interpreted 
his  orders  to  that  officer  as  having  given  the  largest  discretion  which  their 
language  could  be  strained  to  warrant."  1 

The  Fall  of  Fort  Lee. — The  abandonment  of  this  post  necessarily  followed 
the  fall  of  Fort  Washington.  Two  days  later,  Lord  Cornwallis,  who,  if  not 
the  ablest  of  Howe's  generals,  was  esteemed  the  best  qualified  for  the  im- 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p,  193. 


DISLOYALTY  OF  GENERAL  LEE,  313 

portant  work  now  in  hand,  obtained  the  command  in  New  Jersey,  and  with  a 
corps  of  six  thousand  of  the  best  men  in  the  British  army,  entered  on  the 
campaign  which  he  had  promised  his  commander-in-chief  should  'end  the 
rebellion.'  During  the  night  of  the  nineteenth,  the  main  body  of  his  force, 
embracing  two  battalions  of  Hessian  grenadiers,  two  companies  of  yagers, 
and  eight  battalions  of  English,  eluding  the  observation  of  Greene,  crossed 
the  Hudson,  with  their  whole  train  of  artillery,  five  miles  above  Fort  Lee, 
and  dragged  their  cannon  up  the  rugged  side  of  the  Palisades,  where  they 
had  only  to  be  placed  in  position  to  command  the  fort.  The  disgraceful 
result  is  soon  told.  "  Aroused  from  his  bed  by  the  report  of  a  countryman, 
Greene  sent  an  express  to  the  commander-in-chief,  and  having  ordered  his 
troops  under  arms,  took  to  flight  with  more  than  two  thousand  men,  leaving 
blankets  and  baggage,  except  what  his  few  wagons  could  bear  away,  more 
than  three  months'  provisions  for  three  thousand  men,  camp-kettles  on  the 
fire,  above  four  hundred  tents  standing,  and  all  his  cannon,  except  two  twelve- 
pounders.  With  his  utmost  speed  he  barely  escaped  being  cut  off;  but 
Washington,  first  ordering  Grayson,  his  aide-de-camp,  to  renew  the  summons 
to  Lee  to  cross  the  river,  gained  the  bridge  over  the  Hackensack  by  a  rapid 
march,  and  covered  the  retreat  of  the  garrison,  so  that  less  than  ninety 
stragglers  were  taken  prisoners.  The  main  body  of  those  who  escaped  were 
without  tents,  or  blankets,  or  camp  utensils,  but  such  as  they  could  pick  up 
as  they  went  along.  While  the  Americans  were  in  full  retreat,  Reed,  the 
adjutant-general,  ordered  a  horseman  to  hasten  to  Lee  with  an  announcement 
of  the  day's  disaster,  and  as  the  means  of  writing  gave  out,  to  add  the  verbal 
message  :  '  I  pray  you  to  push  and  join  us  j '  and  the  horseman,  without 
further  loss  of  time,  fulfilled  his  commission."  ■ 

Washington's  Orders  treated  with  Contempt. — Lee,  who  never  had  at  heart 
the  triumph  of  the  nation,  paid  no  heed  to  this  urgent  order.  He  had  upwards 
of  seven  thousand  Continental  troops  under  his  command  at  North  Castle,  and 
a  march  of  twenty-four  hours  could  have  effected  a  junction  with  Washington, 
which  would  have  enabled  him,  stripped  as  he  was  of  nearly  all  efficient  muni- 
tions, to  have  at  least  held  Cornvvallis's  victory-flushed  veterans  in  check.  He 
knew  that  the  term  of  three  thousand  of  his  Connecticut  militia  was  expiring— 
that  Washington's  army  had  to  choose  only  between  annihilation  and  flight — 
that  there  was  no  enemy  in  his  own  neighborhood.  And  yet,  for  sixteen  days, 
he  treated  the  reiterated  orders  of  the  Commander-in-chief  with  indifference 
and  contempt.  In  any  other  army  in  the  world,  he  would  have  been  tried  by 
court-martial  for  insubordination,  and  shot.  But  Congress  had  not  yet  learned 
that  successful  campaigns  are  carried  on  only  by  generals-in-chief.  The  lesson 
was  to  be  learned  at  last,  but  only  at  the  expense  of  a  terrific  sacrifice. 

Washington  appeals  to  the  Patriotism  of  New  Jersey \  and  demands  vig- 
orous Measures  from  Congress. — The  Legislature  of  New  Jersey  was  the» 

1  Bancroft,  voL  be,  p.  196. 


314         WASHINGTON'S  RETREAT  THROUGH  THE  JERSEYS. 

sitting  at  Burlington,  and  Reed,  a  native  of  that  State,  was  sent  there  with  a 
strong  appeal  for  instant  aid.  General  Mifflin,  who  was  as  '  true  as  steel,' 
was  despatched  to  Congress.  But  that  body  was  helpless  from  lack  of  means, 
and  they  neglected  to  do  the  only  thing  in  their  power  worth  doing — to  clothe 
Washington  with  additional  authority  in  the  pressing  exigency.  Mifflin  threw 
himself  upon  the  old  Committee  of  Safety,  the  new  Assembly  of  the  State, 
and  the  patriotism  of  the  city.  The  old  Independence  bell  sounded  the 
alarm,  and  the  chief  citizens  assembled  for  council,  with  Rittenhouse  in  the 
chair.1  Mifflin  set  the  fire  blazing,  and  his  appeal  was  answered  by  acclama- 
tions. 

Washington' s  Retreat  through  the  Jerseys. — The  miracle  of  Brooklyn, 
which  was  the  work  of  forty  hours  from  its  first  inception,  was  now  to  be 
re-enacted  during  forty  days,  in  every  one  of  whose  moments  the  storm-clouds 
were  gathering  with  darker  peril.  Salvation  seemed  beyond  the  power  of 
earth,  or  the  vigilance  of  heaven.  On  the  twenty-eighth  of  November,  while 
the  advanced  guard  of  Cornwallis  was  entering  Newark,  the  rear  of  the 
Americans  was  leaving  it  in  a  flying  march  towards  Brunswick,  which  they 
reached  that  night.     It  was  a  brief  respite  from  hunger,  exhaustion,  and  cold. 

Washington  on  the  last  Night  of  November,  1776. — While  the  broken 
ranks  of  his  fugitive  army  were  taking  such  rest  as  the  wearied  find  in  sleep, 
and  the  wounded  in  death,  let  us  look  into  the  tent  of  the  National  Leader. 
Messenger  after  messenger  had  been  despatched — sometimes  twice  a  day — 
and  they  rode  hard — with  every  species  of  order,  and  even  of  imploration,  to 
General  Lee  to  hasten  to  the  relief  of  the  Commander-in-chief.  But  the 
heartless  villain  still  played  the  laggard.  Reed  had  slunk  from  his  mission 
to  the  Legislature  of  his  native  State,  and  shirking  his  duty  in  the  cowardice 
of  resignation,  sent  back  his  commission  to  the  President  of  Congress,  '  since 
he  could  not  wholly  overcome  his  reluctance  at  following  the  wretched 
remains  of  a  broken  army.'  The  State  of  '  Maryland  was  willing  to  renounce 
the  Declaration  of  the  Fourth  of  July,  for  the  sake  of  an  accommodation 
with  Great  Britain.'  For  a  statement  which  I  regret  to  make,  I  quote  a  high 
authority. 

To  complicate  Washington's  difficulties,  darken  his  hopes,  and  embarrass 

1  David  Rittenhouse  was  born  near  Germantown,  a  spectacle  never  seen  but  twice  before  by  an  inhabi- 

Pennsylvania,  on  the  8th  of  April,  1732.     His  ances-  tant  of  earth — and  he  was  so  much  affected  by  its  proof 

tors  were  from  Holland.     His  early  life  was  spent  in  of  the  accuracy  of  his  calculations  that  he  fainted.     He 

agricultural  pursuits,   and  was  marked  by  a  love  of  was  engaged  in  government  surveys,  fixing  territorial 

mathematical  studies.     Feeble  health  would  not  allow  boundaries,  etc.,  during  the  Revolution,  and  became 

him  to  pursue  the  labors  of  a  farm,  and  he  became,  by  one  of  the  leading  practical  philosophers  of  the  day. 

self-instruction,  a  proficient   clock  and   mathematical  On    the   death  of  Franklin   in    1791,   he   was   chosen 

instrument  maker.     It  was  while  working  at  his  trade  President  of  the  Philosophical  Society,  which  office  he 

he  planned  and  executed  his  orrery,  a  piece  of  median-  held   by  annual   election   until   his   death.      He  was 

ism  far  superior  for  its  intended  purposes,  to  anything  Treasurer   of  Pennsylvania,    from    1777   to    1789.     In 

before  constructed.     It  was  purchased  by  the  College  1792,  he  was  appointed  Director  of  the  Mint  of  the 

of  New  Jersey.     Another  was  made  by  him,  after  the  United  States;  but  ill-health  compelled  him  to  resign 

same  model,  for  the  College  of  Philadelphia.     He  pur-  the  office  in  1795.      He  died  on  the  26th  of  June  1796, 

sued  his  trade  in  that  city  for  several  years.     His  first  aged  64  years.     His  birth-place  is  yet  standing  a  mile 

philosophical  publication  was  an  account  of  his  calcu-  west  of  Germantown. — Lossing's  Field-Book  0/  tki 

lations  of  the  transit  of  Venus,  as  it  was  to  happen  on  Revolution,  vol.  ii.,  p.  36. 
the  3d  of  June,  1769.     He  observed  the  phenomenon —  a  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  199. 


DARKEST  HOURS  OF  THE  REVOLUTION.  3l5 

every  step  he  took,  the  British  commander  was  scattering  his  proclamations 
of  pardons  and  rewards  for  every  deserter  who  would  renounce  the  cause  of 
the  suffering  patriots  and  go  over  to  the  king.  The  very  rich  on  the  one 
side,  and  the  very  poor  on  the  other — neither  of  whom,  take  them  as  classes, 
can  be  generally  depended  on  by  any  nation  that  is  in  deep  trouble,  the 
one  being  too  selfish  to  be  disinterested,  and  the  other  too  needy  to  be 
independent — these  classes  deserted  the  American  cause.  But  a  fine  exempli- 
fication was  now  given,  of  the  eternal  difference  between  form  and  substance 
— between  numbers  and  strength.  When  whole  ranks  were  deserting,  the 
men  who  did  stand  at  all,  stood  firm  as  rocks.  Some  names  that  had  become 
illustrious  and  beloved  while  the  day-spring  was  breaking  over  the  new-born 
Republic,  embellished  the  scroll  of  defection.  Samuel  Tucker  had  presided 
over  the  convention  which  gave  New  Jersey  her  free  constitution — had  headed 
her  committee  of  safety — been  her  treasurer  and  supreme  judge — he  crawled 
back  to  Lord  Howe's  feet  to  proffer  his  oath  of  allegiance.  Andrew  Allen, 
of  Philadelphia,  who  had  been  a  member  of  the  Continental  Congress,  with  his 
two  brothers,  and  Joseph  Galloway,  deserted  the  patriot  cause  to  secure  their 
imperilled  estates.  *  Even  John  Dickinson,  who  was  free  from  malice,  and 
struck  wounds  only  into  his  own  breast,  discredited  the  Continental  paper, 
and  for  two  or  three  months  longer  was  so  thoroughly  convinced  of  the  neces- 
sity of  returning  to  the  old  state  of  dependence,  that  he  refused  to  accept 
from  Delaware  an  appointment  to  the  Congress  of  the  United  States.' l 

Such  was  the  thick  darkness  which  hung  over  the  patriot  camp  of  shiver- 
ing soldiers ;  such  the  despondency  of  the  patriot  generals ;  such  the  appa- 
rent hopelessness  of  the  patriot  cause.  But  none  of  this  gloom  found  shelter 
in  the  great  soul  of  the  patriot  leader.  While  those  who  could  sleep  had  laid 
themselves  down  to  rest,  Washington's  camp  was  a  scene  of  cheerfulness. 
His  indomitable  courage  was  never  shaken,  his  hope  could  not  be  quenched. 
He  sat  most  of  the  night  at  a  little  deal  table,  writing  letters,  to  Congress 
suggesting  measures  of  the  greatest  urgency,  and  to  Governors  of  States  and  per- 
sonal friends,  all  filled  with  wise  suggestions,  earnest  appeals,  and  words  of 
encouragement.  In  reply  to  the  generous  William  Livingston's  assurances 
of  sympathy,  he  said  :  '  I  will  not  despair ' — And  yet  he  knew  that  when  the 
roll-call  should  beat  the  next  morning  it  would  decimate  his  little  army,  for 
the  term  of  the  Jersey  and  Maryland  brigades  had  expired,  and  the  frag- 
ment left  must  continue  the  flight.  All  his  powers  of  persuasion— and  they 
often  proved  irresistible — were  of  no  avail  now.  But  he  bore  himself  with 
his  wonted  cheerfulness,  and  his  parting  words  of  fraternal  kindness  brought 
tears  to  the  eyes  of  many  a  brave  man  whose  purpose  was  for  a  moment 
shaken,  till  it  gave  way  to  irrepressible  longings  for  home. 

The  Flight  towards  the  Delaware. — At  daybreak  on  the  first  of  Decern 
ber,  the  village  of  New  Brunswick  was  the  theatre  of  strange  scenes.     The 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  199. 


3 1 6  THE  BRITISH  ARMY  RE  A  CHES  THE  DEL  A  WARE. 

discharged  soldiers  of  the  disbanded  and  disarmed  brigades  were  fast  dis- 
solving in  the  wide-spreading  fields,  seeking  shelter  behind  the  coverts  of 
friendly  woods ;  the  enfeebled  band  who  still  rallied  round  the  stripes  and 
stars  had  crossed  the  Raritan,  and  were  tearing  down  the  bridge  behind  them ; 
while  the  solid  squadrons  of  the  cavalry  of  Cornwallis  were  dashing  over  the 
deserted  camping-ground  where  the  little  fires  of  the  patriots  were  still  burn- 
ing. Leaving  Stirling  in  his  rear  with  twelve  hundred  of  his  three  thousand 
men,  to  watch  the  enemy's  movements,  Washington  led  the  rest  on  to  Tren- 
ton, where  he  transferred  his  baggage  and  stores  across  the  Delaware  ;  and 
immediately  returned  with  a  thousand  of  his  most  effective  men,  where  he 
waited  in  the  vain  hope  of  being  reinforced  by  Lee.  Again  and  again  he 
sent  messages,  each  still  more  urgent  than  the  last,  hoping  '  to  animate  him 
to  rapid  movements,  by  informing  him  fully  of  his  desperate  situation.'  But 
no  reinforcements  came. 

Washington  rejoins  Stirling. — On  the  sixth,  Cornwallis  was  reinforced 
by  Howe  in  person,  with  a  brigade  from  New  York,  and  they  pushed  on  towards 
the  Delaware.  Anxious  for  Stirling's  safety,  Washington  turned  back 
towards  Princeton.  On  the  road  he  was  met  by  that  officer's  detachment 
in  full  flight  before  the  overwhelming  British  columns.  The  whole  body 
pressed  on  to  Trenton  and  commenced  the  embarkation  across  the  river. 
Foreseeing  this  emergency,  Washington  had  made  the  completest  preparation. 
The  first  recourse  was  to  place  the  broad  Delaware,  now  deep  and  angry 
with  its  winter  currents,  between  him  and  the  foe.  When  night  shut  down, 
after  the  trials  of  that  perilous  seventh  of  December,  the  rear-guard  of  what 
there  was  left  of  the  American  army,  stood  watching  the  approach  of  the 
British  forces  from  the  east,  secure  at  least  of  the  fact  that  the  Delaware 
banks  had  been  swept  by  Washington's  trusty  men,  and  that  along  the  wide 
space  of  seventy  miles,  not  even  a  fishing-smack  had  been  left  on  the  Jersey 
shore. 

The  British  Army  reaches  the  Delaware. — When  Cornwallis  rode  into 
Trenton,  he  discovered  that  his  prey  had  escaped  him.  He  had  already  been 
told  that  there  were  no  means  for  crossing ;  and  overlooking  the  dark,  sullen 
flood  that  nature  had  interposed  as  a  barricade  more  formidable  than  human 
hand  ever  reared,  he  cursed  the  dilatory  policy  of  Howe,  who,  after  check- 
ing his  pursuit  of  Washington  for  several  days,  had,  after  joining  him,  wasted 
seventeen  hours  at  Princeton  on  the  seventh,  and  consumed  seven  hours  more 
in  a  slow  march  of  twelve  miles,  only  to  find  how  fatal  it  is  in  warfare,  as  in 
the  whole  battle  of  life,  to  be  too  late.  Lord  Howe's  active  force  was  six 
times  more  numerous  than  Washington's  ;  for  in  this  trying  crisis,  when  terror 
had  almost  paralyzed  the  American  army,  numerous  desertions  had  been  con- 
stantly taking  place.  This  retreat  had  been  conducted  in  winter  weather.  Part 
of  the  time,  the  troops  had  marched  barefooted  over  ice,  sleet,  and  frozen 
ground  ;  whenever  they  halted,  Washington,  his  eyes  tremulous  with  tears,  had 
gone  from  rank  to  rank  to  rally  the  expiring  strength  of  his  soldiers.     But  it 


ALARM  IN  PHILADELPHIA.  3  J  7 

required  something  more  than  his  sublimity  of  character  and  disinterestedness 
of  example,  to  breathe  hope  and  confidence  into  the  hearts  of  men  who  had 
left  blood  in  their  snow-tracks  for  so  many  miles.  He  praised  them — he 
blessed  them — he  represented  their  condition  to  Congress — he  was  their  gene- 
ral, their  companion,  their  father — and  all  through  these  dark  days,  like  one 
of  the  ancient  prophets,  he  had  pointed  the  finger  of  faith  to  the  '  pillar  of 
cloud  by  day,  and  the  pillar  of  fire  by  night,'  assuring  them  that  the  hour  of 
deliverance  and  triumph  would  come. 

Alarm  in  Philadelphia. — The  fall  of  Philadelphia  now  seemed  inevitable. 
Gen.  Putnam  was  directed  by  Congress  '  to  throw  up  works  for  the  protec- 
tion of  the  city.'  Mifflin  was  sent  through  the  surrounding  region  to  '  rally 
the  Pennsylvania  freemen  to  arms,'  and  announce  to  them  that  '  help  had 
already  come  from  Europe,  and  more  would  be  received,'  while  Gen.  Lee 
was  on  his  way  to  reinforce  the  commander-in-chief.  Would  it  had  been 
true.  Washington  had  indeed  made  one  more  appeal  to  that  unworthy  pre- 
tender : — '  I  request  and  entreat  you,  and  this  too  by  the  advice  of  all  the 
general  officers  with  me,  to  march  and  join  me  with  your  whole  force  with  all 
possible  expedition.  Do  come  on  :  your  arrival  without  delay  may  be  the 
means  of  preserving  a  city,' — again,  and  a  final  despatch  was  sent  on  the 
eleventh,  by  the  boldest  rider.  ■  The  force  I  have  is  weak,  and  entirely  in- 
competent to  prevent  General  Howe  from  possessing  Philadelphia.  I  must 
therefore  entreat  you  to  push  on  with  every  possible  succor  you  can  bring.' 
This  despatch  was  safely  taken  through,  although  Lee  was  not  to  receive  it. 
As  good  fortune  would  have  it,  the  braggart  had  met  a  well-merited  fate. 
When  he  could  no  longer  find  any  pretext  for  his  criminal  delay,  he  had 
crossed  the  Hudson — Dec.  3d — but  hung  back  from  an  advance  which  would 
have  enabled  Washington  to  rescue  the  national  capital,  and  perhaps  the 
country  itself  from  the  tyranny  of  a  foreign  oppressor. 

Capture  of  Lee. — Finally,  on  the  twelfth,  as  his  corps  was  advancing  by 
slow  marches  under  Sullivan,  Lee,  in  the  boastful  spirit  he  so  often  displayed, 
dashed  off  from  the  flank  some  three  or  four  miles,  attended  only  by  a  small 
body-guard,  and  pulling  up  to  an  inviting  tavern,  concluded  to  pass  the 
night.  He  rose  late  the  next  morning,  and  after  finishing  his  breakfast  whiled 
away  another  hour  in  writing  a  confidential  letter  to  Gates,  adroitly  attempt- 
ing to  undermine  the  influence  and  authority  of  Washington,  and  displaying 
throughout,  a  spirit  of  animosity  to  his  superior,  and  treason  to  his  adopted 
country.  He  had  signed  the  letter ;  but  before  he  had  time  to  fold  it,  one  of 
his  officers  cried  out  at  the  window,  'The  British  cavalry  are  on  us.' 
1  Within  two  minutes,  he  who  had  made  it  his  habitual  boast  that  he  would 
never  be  taken  alive,  sneaked  out  unarmed,  bareheaded,  without  cloak,  in 
slippers  and  blanket-coat,  his  collar  open,  his  shirt  very  much  soiled  from 
several  days'  wear,  pale  from  fear,  with  the  abject  manner  of  a  coward,  and 
entreated  the  dragoons  to  spare  his  life.     They  seized  him  just  as  he  was,  and 


3i 8  FLIGHT  OF  CONGRESS  TO  BALTIMORE. 

set  him  on  Wilkinson's  horse,  which  stood  ready  saddled  at  the  door.  One  of 
his  aids  who  came  out  with  him,  was  mounted  behind  Harcourt's  servant ; 
and  at  the  signal  by  the  trumpet,  just  four  minutes  from  the  time  of  surround- 
ing the  house,  they  began  their  return.  On  the  way,  Lee  recovered  from  his 
panic,  and  ranted  violently  about  his  having  for  a  moment  obtained  the 
supreme  command,  giving  many  signs  of  wildness,  and  of  a  mind  not  perfectly 
right.  At  Princeton,  when  he  was  brought  in,  he  was  denied  the  use  of 
materials  for  writing ;  and  an  officer  and  two  guards  were  placed  in  his 
room.  He  demanded  to  be  received  under  the  November  proclamation  of 
the  Howes ;  and  on  being  refused  its  benefits,  and  remanded  that  he  might 
be  tried  as  a  deserter,1  he  flew  into  an  extravagant  rage,  and  railed  at  the 
faithlessness  and  treachery  of  the  Americans  as  the  cause  of  his  mishap.'  2 
Sullivan  thus  succeeding  to  the  command,  and  knowing  full  well  the  orders 
and  desire  of  Washington,  pushed  his  detachment  on  till  he  reached  the  head- 
quarters of  the  Commander-in-chief. 

Flight  of  Congress  to  Baltimore. — It  was  now  everywhere  known  that  the 
British  army  had  reached  the  Delaware,  and  were  posted  in  overwhelming 
numbers  along  its  eastern  bank.  Fugitives  from  every  quarter  were  seeking 
refuge  with  their  treasures  in  Philadelphia,  and  in  its  apparent  helplessness  the 
Continental  Congress  called  on  '  all  the  States  to  appoint  a  day  of  fasting  and 
prayer  for  divine  deliverance.'  Aware  that  their  abandonment  of  the  city 
was  suspected,  they  '  Resolved,  that  Washington  should  contradict,  in  general 
orders,  the  false  and  malicious  report  that  they  were  about  to  disperse,  or 
adjourn  from  Philadelphia,  unless  the  last  necessity  should  direct  it.'  Wash- 
ington had  the  discretion  to  disregard  the  request,  and  the  event  justified  his 
course ;  for  on  the  following  day,  at  the  advice  of  Putnam  and  Mifflin,  they 
voted  to  adjourn  to  Baltimore.  This  act  was  stoutly  resisted  by  Samuel 
Adams,  in  whose  generous  soul  the  fires  of  patriotic  enthusiasm  never  burned 
low  : — *  I  do  not  regret,'  he  said  during  that  debate,  as  we  learn  in  substance 
from  his  own  letters,  '  the  part  I  have  taken  in  a  cause  so  just  and  interesting 
to  mankind.  The  people  of  Pennsylvania  and  the  Jerseys,  seem  determined  to 
give  it  up  ;  but  I  trust  that  my  dear  New  England  will  maintain  it  at  the  ex- 
pense of  everything  dear  to  them  in  this  life ;  they  know  how  to  prize  their 
liberties.  May  Heaven  bless  them.  If  this  city  should  be  surrendered,  I 
should  by  no  means  despair.  Britain  will  strain  every  nerve  to  subjugate 
America  next  year ;  she  will  call  wicked  men  and  devils  to  her  aid.  Our 
affairs  abroad  wear  a  promising  aspect ;  but  I  conjure  you  not  to  depend  too 
much  upon  foreign  aid.     Let  America  exert  her  own  strength.     Let  her  de- 

1  General  Howe  refused  to  see  Lee  at  Princeton,  but  2  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  210-11.      He  also  pays  the 

ordered  him  to  be  held  as  a  deserter  from  the  British  following    well-deserved    tribute    to    the    painstaking 

army,  and  he  was  taken  under  a  close  guard  to  Bruns-  author  to  whom  he  is  indebted  for  his  account  : — '  Geo. 

wick,  and  afterwards  to  New  York,  where  none  of  the  H.  Moore's  Treason  of Lee  is  the  fruit  of  comprehensive 

British   officers,   whose  'good  society'   he   had  once  and  thorough  research.     It  is  confirmed  by  documerti 

lauded  so  highly,  would  have  anything  to  do  with  him  ;  of  unquestionable  authenticity,  and  is  the  first  correct 

for  they   knew  that  he  had  never  joined  the  patriot  sketch  of  the  early  career  of  Lee  in  the  American  ser- 

cause  from  principle,  but  from  the  basest  mercenary  vice.' 
motives. 


A  DEEPER  GLOOM  OVER  THE  COUNTRY.  319 

pend  on  God's  blessing,  and  He  who  cannot  be  indifferent  to  her  righteous 
cause,  will  even  work  miracles  if  necessary  to  carry  her  through  this  glorious 
conflict,  and  establish  her  feet  upon  a  rock.'  Bancroft  is  doubtless  justified 
in  characterizing  it  as  "  the  needless  flight  of  Congress,  which  took  place 
amidst  the  jeers  of  Tories  and  the  maledictions  of  patriots,  gave  a  stab  to 
public  credit,  and  fostered  a  general  disposition  to  refuse  Continental  money. 
At  his  home  near  the  sea,  John  Adams  was  as  stout  of  heart  as  ever.  The 
conflict  thus  far  had  been  less  severe  than  he  from  the  first  expected  ;  though 
greater  disappointments  should  be  met,  though  France  should  hold  back, 
though    Philadelphia   should   fall,  \  I, '  said   he,  *  do   not  doubt  of  ultimate 


A  deeper  Gloom  settles  over  the  Country. — The  last  hope  of  the  nation  now 
centred  on  Washington.  Only  a  few  days  were  left  of  the  year  1776,  and  on 
the  1  st  of  January  a  large  portion  of  the  little  American  army  would  have 
fulfilled  their  engagements ;  their  enlistments  would  expire.  Some  electric 
shock  must  be  sent  through  the  staggering,  bleeding,  and  disheartened  colonial 
army,  or  it  would  be  disbanded.  The  letters  of  Washington,  written  to  con- 
fidential friends  during  this  period,  clearly  indicate  that  he  was  maturing  a 
plan,  whose  execution  should  alone  reveal  his  concealed  purpose.  Howe 
regarded  the  campaign  for  the  year  as  ended,  and  granting  leave  of  absence 
to  Cornwallis  to  visit  England,  and  receive  his  share  of  the  honors  that  were 
to  crown  their  boasted  feats  of  strategy  and  valor,  he  congratulated  his 
nephew — the  king — on  the  success  of  his  arms,  and  confidently  assured  him 
that  a  brief  spring  campaign  would  put  a  final  end  to  the  rebellion.  ■  I  am 
informed,'  he  wrote,  *  by  many  prominent  persons  who  had  participated  in 
the  early  and  inconsiderate  movements  of  the  rebels,  but  who  have  returned  to 
their  allegiance  since  the  cause  became  desperate,  that  Washington's  so-called 
army  will  dissolve  by  the  New  Year,  when  their  engagements  expire.'  In  this 
belief  the  British  commander  prepared  to  return  to  New  York  for  his  winter 
quarters,  where  he  could  regale  himself  in  those  indulgences  which  were  more 
grateful  to  his  easy  and  voluptuous  habits,  than  the  inconveniences  and  expo- 
sures of  the  open  field.'  Grant  was  left  in  command  of  Cornwallis' s  division, 
while  the  merciless  Donop  was  charged  with  the  business  of  hanging  from  the 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  215.  him  difficult  of  access,  and  gained  him  the  reputation 
*  The  British  commander-in-chief,  General  Wil-  of  being  haughty  and  morose.  His  indolence  was  his 
liain  Howe,  by  illegitimate  descent  an  uncle  to  bane  :  not  wholly  merciless,  he  permitted  his  prisoners 
tin  king,  was  of  a  very  different  character  [from  to  suffer  from  atrocious  cruelty  ;  not  meaning  that  his 
Washington].  Six  feet  tall,  of  an  uncommonly  dark  troops  should  be  robbed,  he  left  peculators  uncontrolled, 
complexion,  i^parse  frame,  and  a  sluggish  mould,  he  and  the  army  and  the  hospitals  were  wronged  by  con 
was  unresist^»^  ruled  by  his  sensual  nature.  He  was  tractors.  His  notions  of  honor  in  money  matters  were 
not  much  in  jpnest  against  the  Americans,  partly  be-  not  nice,  but  he  was  not  so  much  rapacious  as  insatiable 
cause  he  was  persuaded  they  could  not  be  reduced  by  Disliking  to  have  his  personal  comforts  infringed,  he 
arms,  partly  because  he  professed  to  be  a  liberal  in  indulged  freely  in  the  pleasures  of  the  table ;  without 
politics,  partly  because  he  never  kindled  with  zeal  any  delicacy  of  passion,  kept  a  mistress;  and  loved  to 
for  anything.  He  had  had  military  experience,  and  shake  off  dull  indifference  by  the  hazards  of  the  faro- 
had  read  books  on  war  ;  but  being  destitute  of  quick-  table.  His  officers  were  expected  to  be,  in  the  field, 
ness  of  thought  and  will,  he  was  formed  to  carry  on  insensible  to  danger,  like  himself;  in  their  quarters,  he 
war  by  rule.  He  would  not  march  till  he  could  move  was  willing  they  should  openly  lead  a  profligate  life  ; 
deliberately,  with  ample  means  of  transportation.  On  and  his  example  led  many  of  the  young  to  theii 
the  field  of  battle  he  sometimes  showed  talent  as  an  ruin  by  gaming.  He  had  nothing  heroic  about  him, 
executive  officer :  but,  except  in  moments  of  high  ex-  wanting  altogether  the  quick  eye,  the  instant  com- 
citement,  he  was  lethargic,  wanting  alertness  and  saga-  bination,  and  the  commanding  energy  of  a  great  war- 
city.  He  hated  business,  and  his  impatience  at  being  rior. — Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  99-100. 
forced  to  attend  to  it,  joined  to  a  fc  -nily  gloom,  made 


320  APPROACHING  DOOM  OF  THE  HESSIANS. 

nearest  tree  any  of  the  inhabitants  of  New  Jersey  'who  should  separately,  o\ 
in  bands,  fire  upon  any  British  soldiers.'  He  had  under  him  two  Hessian 
brigades,  a  troop  of  mounted  yagers,  and  the  forty-second  Highlanders,  who 
during  the  war  brought  upon  their  country  a  disgrace,  to  which  the  Scotch 
name  had  always  been  a  stranger.  The  brutal  character  of  the  Hessians  was 
proverbial  from  the  beginning.  Neither  life  nor  property  of  friend  or  foe,  was 
held  sacred  by  these  foreign  hirelings.  All  authorities  agree,  too,  that  there 
were  '  examples  where  English  soldiers  forced  women  to  suffer  what  was  worse 
than  death,  and  on  one  occasion  pursued  girls,  still  children  in  years,  who 
had  fled  to  the  woods.  The  attempts  to  restrain  the  Hessians  were  given  up, 
under  the  apology  that  the  habit  of  plunder  prevented  desertions.  A  British 
officer  reports  'officially : — They  were  led  to  believe,  before  they  left  Hesse-Cassel, 
that  they  were  to  co?ne  to  America  to  establish  their  private  fortunes,  and  hitherto 
they  have  certainly  acted  with  that  principle.' 

The  approaching  Doom  of  the  Hessians. — Rail,  their  leader,  as  a  reward  for 
his  '  valuable  services,'  had  obtained  the  separate  command  of  Trenton,  with 
a  troop  of  yagers  and  dragoons,  in  addition  to  his  own  Hessian  brigade.  On 
this  pitiless  marauder  and  his  murderous  band,  Washington  kept  his  eye 
steadily  bent,  taxing  his  utmost  power  of  invention  and  resource,  to  devise 
some  plan  for  his  destruction.  It  was  at  last  matured,  and  the  moment  had 
come  when,  if  ever,  it  must  be  carried  out.  In  a  despatch  of  the  eighteenth, 
General  Grant  wrote  to  Lord  Howe  :  '  I  am  certain  the  rebels  no  longer  have 
any  strong  corps  on  this  side  of  the  river  ;  the  story  of  Washington's  crossing  the 
Delaware  at  this  season  of  the  year,  is  not  to  be  believed.'  Donop,  with  more 
sagacity,  had  hinted  to  Rail  the  wisdom  of  flanking  Trenton  by  garrisoned  re- 
doubts ;  but  the  Hessian  commander,  inflated  by  his  promotion  to  new 
honors,  despised  the  suggestion  : — 'Let  them  come  !  What  need  of  entrench- 
ments ?    We'll  at  them  with  cutlass  and  bayonet.' 

The  Interval  before  the  Blow  fell. — Every  moment  of  it  was  crowded  with 
activity ;  but  the  preparations  were  made  with  so  little  ostentation,  that  his 
ultimate  design  remained  undetected.  His  letters  to  Congress  during  the 
next  ten  days  were,  as  the  future  showed,  among  the  most  important  he  ever 
wrote.  They  should  be  carefully  studied  by  every  reader  who  prizes  that 
luxury  of  curiosity  and  wisdom — gazing  into  the  clear  fountains  from  which 
the  streams  of  history  flow.1  Experience  had  taught  him  the  lessons  which  he 
pressed  upon  Congress,  with  that  clear  and  earnest  simplicity  which  was  be- 
ginning to  be  understood.  A  few  passages  from  those  luminous  State  Papers 
— for  time  has  lifted  them  into  that  dignity — will  photograph  to  us,  as  no  other 
picture  can,  the  moral  and  physical  scenery  of  those  dark  hours. 

1  Sparks'  Life  and  Letters  of  Washington.  Of  all     life,  and  all  his  Letters  were  the  artless  expressions  of 
the  books  yet  published,  or  probably  ever  will  be,  that     his  own  candid  soul,  and  distinguished  by  a  clearness 


work  is  best  worthy  to  be  called  the  Student's  Guide  and  simplicity  very  rare  in  the  official  or  familiar  writ- 

to  the  character  of  Washington.      No   biography,  ings  of  eminent  public  men,  th 

however  accurate  or  brilliant,  can  ever  portray  Wash-  struct  mankind  forever.     In  an 

ington  so  perfectly  as  his  own  letters.     The  Correspon-  shall  speak  of  the  immense  sen 

dence  extends  through  the  long  period  of  his  eventful  dered  to  American  Literature. 


WASHINGTON'S  PLAN  FOR  SAVING  THE  NATION.         321 

Washington1  s  Painting  of  the  Situation,  and  his  Plan  for  Success. — All 
had  been  hitherto  but  doubtful  conflict,  in  the  midst  of  chaos.  Order  must  take 
its  place.  Doubt  must  give  way  to  certainty  :  incoherence  to  compactness  : 
feebleness  to  strength  :  inchoate  nebulae  to  a  clearly-defined  system  of  crys- 
tallized power. 

Fresh  battalions  must  be  drawn  from  the  bosom  of  the  People. 

They  must  be  Organized  as  a  National  Army.  Thus  alone  could 
the  Military  forces  in  the  field,  represent  the  Civil  power  of 
the  Thirteen  United  States  in  its  Councils. 

This  was  the  conception  of  the  Leader.  On  its  adoption  was  to  hang  the 
solvation  of  the  Republic.     He  thus  presented  it : — 

December  12. — 'Perhaps  Congress  have  some  hope  and  prospect  of  rein- 
forcements. I  have  no  intelligence  of  the  sort ;  and  wish  to  be  informed  on 
the  subject.  Our  little  handful  is  daily  decreasing  by  sickness  and  other 
causes  ;  and  without  considerable  exertions  on  the  part  of  the  people,  what 
can  we  reasonably  look  for  ?     The  subject  is  disagreeable  ;  but  yet  it  is  true.' 

December  16. — *  I  am  more  and  more  convinced  of  the  necessity  of  rais- 
ing more  battalions  for  the  new  army  than  what  we  have  voted.  The  enemy 
will  leave  nothing  unessayed  in  the  next  campaign  ;  and  fatal  experience  has 
given  its  sanction  to  the  truth,  that  the  militia  are  not  to  be  depended  on,  but 
in  cases  of  the  most  pressing  emergency.' 

December  20. — *  I  have  waited  with  much  impatience,  to  know  the  deter- 
mination of  Congress  on  the  propositions  made  in  October  last,  for  augment- 
ing our  corps  of  artillery.  The  time  has  come  when  it  cannot  be  delayed 
without  the  greatest  injury  to  the  safety  of  these  States,  and,  therefore,  under 
the  resolution  of  Congress,  bearing  date  the  12th  instant,  by  the  pressing 
advice  of  all  the  general  officers  now  here,  I  have  ventured  to  order  three 
battalions  of  artillery,  to  be  immediately  recruited.  This  may  appear  to  Con- 
gress premature  and  unwarrantable  ;  but  the  present  exigencies  of  our  affairs 
will  not  admit  of  delay,  either  in  the  council  or  in  the  field.  Ten  days  more 
will  put  an  end  to  the  existence  of  this  army.  If,  therefore,  in  the  short  inter- 
val in  which  we  have  to  make  these  arduous  preparations,  every  matter  that 
in  its  nature  is  self-evident,  is  to  be  referred  to  Congress  at  the  distance  of  a 
hundred  and  thirty  or  forty  miles,  so  much  time  must  elapse  as  to  defeat  the 
end  in  view.' 

And  these  important  passages  follow  : — '  It  may  be  said  that  this  is  an 
application  for  powers  too  dangerous  to  be  intrusted ;  I  can  only  say,  that 
desperate  diseases  require  desperate  remedies.  I  have  no  lust  after  power  ; 
I  wish,  with  as  much  fervency  as  any  man  on  this  wide-extended  continent,  for 
an  opportunity  of  turning  the  sword  into  the  ploughshare  ;  but  my  feelings,  as 
an  officer  and  a  man,  have  been  such  as  to  force  me  to  say,  that  no  person 
ever  had  a  greater  choice  of  difficulties  to  contend  with  than  I  have.  It  is 
needless  to  add,  that  short  enlistments,  and  a  mistaken  dependence  upon 
militia,  have  been  the  origin  of  all  our  misfortunes,  and  of  the  great  accumu- 
lation of  our  debt.  The  enemy  are  daily  gathering  strength  from  the  disaf- 
21 


322  THE  LEADER'S  ADVICE  TAKEN. 

fected.  This  strength  will  increase,  unless  means  can  be  devised  to  check 
effectually  the  progress  of  his  arms.  Militia  may  possibly  do  it  for  a  little 
while  ;  but  the  militia  of  these  States  which  have  been  frequently  called  upon, 
will  not  turn  out  at  all ;  if  they  do,  it  will  be  with  so  much  reluctance  and 
sloth  as  to  amount  to  the  same  thing.  Instance  New  Jersey  !  witness  Pennsyl- 
vania !  The  militia  come  in,  you  cannot  tell  how ;  go,  you  cannot  tell  when  ; 
and  act,  you  cannot  tell  where  ;  consume  your  provisions,  exhaust  your 
stores,  and  leave  you  at  last  at  a  critical  moment.  These  are  the  men 
I  am  to  depend  on  ten  days  hence:  this  is  the  basis  on  which  your  cause  must 
forever  depend,  till  you  get  a  standing  army,  sufficient  of  itself  to  oppose 
the  enemy.  This  is  not  a  time  to  stand  upon  expense.  If  any  good  officers 
will  offer  to  raise  men  upon  Continental  pay  and  establishment  in  this  quarter, 
I  shall  encourage  them  to  do  so,  and  regiment  them  when  they  have  done  it. 
If  Congress  disapprove  of  this  proceeding,  they  will  please  to  signify  it,  as  I 
mean  it  for  the  best.  It  may  be  thought  I  am  going  a  good  deal  out  of  the 
line  of  my  duty,  to  adopt  these  measures,  or  to  advise  thus  freely.  A  charac- 
ter to  lose,  an  estate  to  forfeit,  the  inestimable  blessings  of  liberty  at  stake, 
and  a  life  devoted,  must  be  my  excuse.' 

December  24th. — On  this  day,  just  on  the  eve  of  his  contemplated  move- 
ment, he  said  :  '  Very  few  have  enlisted  again,  not  more  from  an  aversion  to 
the  service,  than  from  the  non-appointment  of  officers  in  some  instances,  the 
turning  out  of  good  and  appointing  of  bad  in  others.  The  last  of  this  month 
I  shall  be  left  with  from  fourteen  to  fifteen  hundred  effective  men  in  the 
whole.  This  handful,  and  such  militia  as  may  choose  to  join  me,  will  then 
compose  our  army.  When  I  reflect  on  these  things,  they  fill  me  with  concern. 
To  guard  against  General  Howe's  designs,  and  the  execution  of  them,  shall 
employ  my  every  exertion  ;  but  how  is  this  to  be  done  ?  ' 

Washington 's  Advice  was  taken. — Congress  understood  these  despatches. 
They  hardly  needed  the  confirmation  of  Greene,  but  they  received  it  with  the 
well-merited  confidence  which  the  character  of  that  true  man  inspired.  He 
wrote  : — '  I  am  far  from  thinking  the  American  cause  desperate,  yet  I  con- 
ceive it  to  be  in  a  critical  situation.  To  remedy  evils,  the  General  should 
have  power  to  appoint  officers  to  enlist  at  large.  The  present  existence  of 
the  civil,  depends  upon  the  military  power.  I  am  no  advocate  for  the  exten- 
sion of  military  powers ;  neither  would  I  advise  it  at  present,  but  from  the 
fullest  conviction  of  its  being  absolutely  necessary.  There  never  was  a  man 
that  might  be  more  safely  trusted,  nor  a  time  when  there  was  a  louder  call.' 

The  General-in-Chief  was  authorized  to  recruit  and  organize  twenty-two 
battalions  for  the  National  Army,  under  the  authority  of  the  United 
States.     The  tide  had  changed. 


NEW  ERA  IN  THE  WAR  FOR  INDEPENDENCE.  323 


SECOND  SECTION. 

NEW   ERA    IN    THE    WAR    FOR    INDEPENDENCE WASHINGTON   CLOTHED   WITH 

AUTHORITY  TO   PROSECUTE    IT. 

The  preliminary  skirmishing  was  over — the  war  for  Independence  began. 
Rail  lay  complacently,  if  not  securely,  with  his  Hessians  at  Trenton,  and 
there  was  the  first  point  of  attack.  '  Our  numbers,'  wrote  Washington,  *  are 
less  than  I  had  any  conception  of;  but  necessity,  dire  necessity,  will — nay, 
must— justify  an  attack.'     He  had  just  counted  his  men. 

The  Position  of  the  National  Army  on  the  Twenty-third  of  December, 
1776. — The  headquarters  were  at  Newtown,  Pennsylvania,  not  far  from  the 
Delaware  river.  Gates  and  Sullivan  had  come  in — the  former  with  the  frag- 
ments of  the  four  New  England  regiments, — only  five  hundred  in  all, — but  to 
be  counted  on,  since  they  were  led  by  John  Stark,  that  brave  old  campaigner 
of  New  Hampshire,  over  whose  stalwart  frame  time  had  left  no  trace  but  the 
frost  in  his  locks ; — Sullivan  with  the  division  which  Lee  had  so  long  kept 
back  from  the  front.  Washington  was  at  the  head  of  an  army  of  five 
thousand  fighting  men.  He  turned  their  faces  towards  the  Delaware,  with 
the  watchword,  Victory  or  death.     His  plan  was  about  to  be  tested. 

Rumors  of  an  American  movement  were  afloat  in  New  Jersey,  and  they 
reached  the  camp  of  the  British  General  in  command.  But  he  wrote  :  '  There 
will  be  no  crossing  with  a  large  force,  because  the  running  ice  would  make  the 
return  desperate,  or  impracticable.  Besides,  Washington's  men  have  neither 
shoes  nor  stockings,  nor  blankets,  and  are  almost  naked  and  dying  of  cold 
and  want  of  food.'  The  British  commander  had  not  yet  learned  that  the  war 
of  Independence  was  not  to  be  fought  with  blankets,  or  food  or  summer  weather. 

Our  Cause  elsewhere  in  Europe. — Our  enemies  held  the  ocean,  across 
which  their  courier  ships  alone  could  sail.  On  the  day  Sullivan  and  Gates 
reached  Washington's  camp,  Franklin  entered  Paris  on  his  important  mission 
to  the  court  of  Louis  XVI.  He  had  borne  no  cheering  news  to  the  friends 
of  liberty.  It  was  the  darkest  hour  the  American  cause  was  ever  to  see 
abroad.  The  triumph  of  England  seemed  sure.  Voltaire,  the  iconoclast  of 
the  past,  and  the  prophet  of  the  future,  said:  'Franklin's  troops  have  been 
beaten  by  those  of  the  King  of  England.  Alas !  reason  and  liberty  are  ill 
received  in  this  world.'  Cornwallis  was  the  coming  idol  of  England  ;  decora- 
tions were  on  the  way  to  New  York  for  the'victorious  Lord  Howe ;  while  in 
the  quaint  old  town  of  Cassel,  he  was  proclaimed  a  new  Caesar.  Franklin 
was  declared  '  a  fugitive  from  a  felon  cause,'  and  our  friends  in  the  House 
of  Commons  saw  that  '  the  moment  of  reconciliation  had  come.'     So  much 


524  CROSSING  THE  DELAWARE. 

behind  the  destiny  of  America  did  the  genius  for  compromise  of  Rocking 
ham,  and  even  the  inspirations  of  Burke  lag. 

In  the  Camp  of  our  Enemies. — The  good  news  of  the  defeat  of  the  rebels 
had  thrown  the  king  and  his  coterie  into  ecstasies,  and  with  a  facility  which 
royalty  can  command  in  manufacturing  titles  for  its  favorites — equalled  onlv 
by  republics  in  multiplying  money  for  monopolists,  by  the  printing-press — a 
new  patent  for  a  higher  grade  of  nobility  had  been  struck  for  the  bastard  uncle 
of  the  sovereign  of  the  British  Empire,  in  recognition  of  his  military  achieve- 
ments in  '  snuffing  out '  the  flickering  light  of  a  new  republic.  The  mes- 
senger from  the  court  arrived.  New  York — now  become  the  court  city  of  the 
Western  world — blazed  with  all  its  ostentatious  illuminations.  Officers  of  the 
king  would  assist  as  'performers  of  plays  at  the  theatre,  for  the  benefit  of 
the  widows  and  children,  and  sufferers  by  the  war.  The  markets  were  well 
supplied  ;  balls  were  given  to  satiety ;  and  the  dulness  of  evening  parties  was 
dispelled  by  the  faro-table,  where  subalterns  competed  with  their  superiors, 
and  ruined  themselves  by  play.  Howe  fired  his  sluggish  nature  by  wine  and 
good  cheer ;  his  mistress  spent  his  money  prodigally,  but  the  continuance 
of  the  war  promised  him  a  great  fortune.  As  the  fighting  was  over,  Corn- 
wallis  sent  his  baggage  on  board  the  packet  for  England,'  etc. 

On  the  Ice  of  the  Delaware. — The  plan  of  Washington  was  admirably 
conceived,  but  no  part  of  it  was  completely  executed  except  by  himself  in 
person.  With  an  almost  superhuman  discernment  he  chose  among  his  gen- 
eral officers,  Greene,  Sullivan,  Stirling,  and  Mercer,  and  of  field  officers, 
Stark  of  New  Hampshire,  Webb  of  Connecticut,  Hand  of  Philadelphia, 
Knox  and  Glover  of  Massachusetts,  William  Washington  and  James  Munroe 
of  Virginia,  and  Alexander  Hamilton  of  New  York.  The  company  num- 
bered twenty-four  hundred  picked  men,  'ready,  every  devil  of  them,' — as 
Hamilton  afterwards  said  to  his  then  friend  Aaron  Burr, — 'ready  to  storm 
hell's  battlements  in  the  night.'  On  the  afternoon  of  the  twenty- seventh  of 
December,  these  crusaders  of  freedom  began  their  march — every  man  carry- 
ing forty  rounds  of  cartridges,  and  three  days'  rations.  The  eighteen  field- 
pieces  '  by  a  brisk  movement '  struck  the  river  before  dark.  The  current 
was  sullen  and  dark  with  grinding  ice-cakes.  '  Who  leads  the  embarkation  ?  ' 
spoke  out  the  Commander-in-Chief.  '  Marblehead,'  was  the  low,  determined 
answer  from  some  sailor-soldiers"  of  Massachusetts.  Just  then  up  rode  a 
courier  from  Col.  Reed,  saying  that  neither  Putnam  nor  the  troops  from 
Bristol  could  reach  them.  The  next  instant  the  daring  Wilkinson  came 
dashing  up.  He  was  not  expected.  '  How  did  you  trace  us  ? ' — '  Easily,  by 
the  blood-tracks  of  the  boys  over  the  snow.'  Another  messenger,  who  had 
in  some  way  got  across  the  river,  rushed  up  to  Washington  and  wrflspered — 
'  Rail  believes  no  reports  of  our  approach — he  is  in  his  usual  revels.'  The 
word  came  from  a  man  who  could  be  trusted — it  was  believed.  '  All  hands 
over  no  v,  gentlemen — orderly,  quick,  silent,  sure.' 


THE  NIGHT  VICTORY  AT  TRENTON.  325 

The  Weather  that  Night  on  the  Delaware. — Thomas  Rodney  knew  all 
about  it.  He  said  :  *  It  was  as  severe  a  night  as  I  ever  saw.'  The  ice  was 
gathering  thicker — the  wind  from  the  northeast  was  charged  with  sleet  and 
edged  with  frost,  and  for  ten  hours  the  great  company  kept  up  their  steady 
struggle — unwavering,  orderly,  vigilant,  strong.  Before  any  of  the  blackness 
of  night  had  showed  signs  of  a  dawning,  the  last  cannon  had  been  dragged  to 
level  ground  on  the  Jersey  shore,  and  the  column  began  its  march  of  nine 
miles  down  the  river  to  Trenton.  It  was  a  bewildering  tempest — snow,  sleet, 
hail  and  howling  wind  all  mingled  wildly  in  a  driving  winter  storm.  After 
a  hard  march  of  three  or  four  miles,  Sullivan  led  one  division  along  the  bank 
of  the  river,  and  Washington  the  other  by  another  nearly  parallel  road.  The 
two  columns  now  pressed  on  through  the  night  and  storm.  A  messenger 
from  Sullivan  said  :  '  Our  ammunition  is  wet ' — !  Back  to  your  General  and 
say :  We  will  use  only  bayonets  to-night.  We  must  take  the  town.'  The 
stirring  tale  has  been  told  ten  thousand  times.  It  is  all  said  in  a-  few  words. 
Washington's  party  from  the  Pennington  road  drove  in  the  pickets  from  one 
quarter  j  Stark,  who  led  Sullivan's  van,  sent  back  a  loud  cheer  from  a  distance 
as  they  drove  in  the  pickets  near  the  river ;  a  hastily  roused  company  from 
the  barracks  gave  way  to  the  unexpected  charge,  and  fled  with  yagers  and 
dragoons  across  the  bridge  over  the  little  Assanpink  stream  which  divides 
the  town.  Sullivan  flanked  them  and  cut  off  their  retreat,  while  Washington, 
holding  his  division  compact,  moved  steadily  but  rapidly  through  King  and 
Queen  streets — ever  after  called  Warren  and  Greene — and  at  meeting  in  the 
concerted  spot  were  forming  in  line  of  battle,  when  the  Hessian  commander, 
roused  from  his  last  night's  debauch,  cried  out  from  his  horse,  which  he  just 
managed  to  mount,  '  Advance — forward  march,' — the  soul  of  the  soldier 
struggling  to  speak  through  the  drunkard.  It  was  quick  work.  Rail  sud- 
denly sobered  by  the  cutting  air,  and  bleaching  terror,  tried  to  atone  for  the 
surprise.  He  attempted  to  rally  his  forces,  and  bring  them  into  action.  All 
the  time  the  Americans  were  pouring  in  their  well-regulated  fire  with  the 
steadiness  of  old  troops,  and  the  few  Hessians  who  stood  their  ground  were 
returning  it.  Washington's  horse  was  shot,  but  the  night  victory  was  won. 
A  musket  ball  sent  Rail  reeling  from  his  saddle.  His  aide  at  once  rode  up 
to  Washington  with  his  proffered  swofd — '  Sir,  the  Hessians  have  surrendered.' 
The  retreat  of  '  the  terrible  Knyphausen  regiment '  was  cut  off  by  Lord  Stir- 
ling, and  they  yielded  on  condition  of  retaining  their  side-arms  and  private 
baggage. 

After  the  Battle. — It  had  lasted  thirty-five  minutes.  Only  seventeen 
Hessians  had  fallen  dead,  but  nine  hundred  and  forty- six  had  surrendered  as 
prisoners  of  war.  Six  brass  field-pieces,  twelve  hundred  small  arms,  with  all 
the  colors  of  the  enemy,  were  among  the  trophies  of  the  victory.  But  the 
fruits  of  the  battle  could  be  secured  only  by  placing  the  barricade  of  the 
Delaware  once  more  between  the  patriots  and  the  enemy.  The  rest  of  the 
night  was  consumed  in  recrossing  the  river,  and  before  the  daylight  lit  up  the 


326  WASHINGTON  A T  R ALL'S  DEA  TH-BED. 

still  stormy  heavens,  the  last  transport  had  landed  the  last  patriot  soldier, 
with  the  spoils  and  prisoners  of  war  on  the  Pennsylvania  side.  The  ice- 
craunching  flood  of  the  river  rolled  on,  no  matter  now,  how  dark.  Even  the 
bodies  of  the  only  two  patriots  who  were  killed  in  the  battle  were  brought 
over,  with  those  of  the  only  two  also  who  had  frozen  to  death. 

Washington  and  Greene  at  Rail's  Deathbed. — After  the  surrender  Wash- 
ington had  inquired  for  the  Hessian  commander.  '  He  was  a  brave  soldier,' 
said  the  general  to  Greene.  '  Let  us  look  in  on  him,  for  it  seems  that  his 
campaigns  are  over.'  They  were  shown  to  his  dying-bed  in  a  neighboring 
house.  '  With  a  heart  overflowing  with  generous  emotions,  in  that  hour  of 
triumph,  the  American  chief  offered  the  brave  Rail  those  consolations  which 
a  soldier  and  a  Christian  can  bestow.  This  kindness  and  attention  from  his 
conqueror  soothed  the  agonies  of  the  expiring  hero. 1 

There  will  be  no  space  for  saying  so  much  about  any  other  battle  of  the 
American  Revolution,  for  the  simple  reason  that  no  one  was  to  follow  it  which 
would  be  attended  with  such  great  results.  Its  importance  is  not  to  be  meas- 
ured by  the  number  of  prisoners — least  of  all  by  the  roll  of  the  wounded  or  dead 
on  either  side.  But  if  the  reader  fixes  the  following  facts  in  his  mind,  he  will  gain 
some  faint  idea  of  the  reason  why  this  night  battle  borrowed  from  the  circum- 
stances which  attended  it,  such  wonderful  significance..  Glance  at  a  few 
points. 

First.  It  displayed  qualities  of  generalship  which  made  our  enemies  dread 
the  patriot  commander.  Ever  after,  the  sneer  was  left  out  when  they  men- 
tioned his  name.  Second.  It  reversed  the  judgment  of  European  statesmen 
on  the  prospects  of  our  success,  and  this  made  it  easier  to  gain  allies  to  our 
cause.  Third.  It  nerved  the  arm  of  every  American  in  every  future  battle. 
Fourth.  It  showed  Washington  in  his  true  character  as  a  bold,  and  yet 
prudent  commander — an  original  and  daring  general,  and  yet  a  safe  leader. 
Ever  after  he  was  the  beloved  and  trusted  man  of  the  army.  Fifth.  The 
statesmen  of  the  country  saw  that  in  his  counsels  there  was  victory — that  he 
alone  could  make  good  the  Declaration  of  the  Fourth  of  July.  The  result 
we  know.  It  is,  indeed,  hardly  necessary  to  recount  subsequent  military 
events  with  any  minuteness  of  detail.  Around  Washington  the  chief  reliances 
of  the  people  began  to  cluster.  His  name  became  a  charmed  name. 
From  that  hour,  men,  who  never  saw  him,  began  to  love  him.     And  from 

1   Losslng's  Fie  Id-Book  of  the  Revolution,    vol.  covered  the  approach  of    the  Americans.     The  negro 

ii.,  p.  22.  refused  admittance   to   the  messenger,  saying,   'The 

This  painstaking  historian  also  furnishes  the  following  gemman  can't  be  disturbed.'  The  bearer  knew  the  im- 
incidents  connected  with  the  last  hours  of  Rail's  life  : —  portance  of  the  note,  and  handing  it  to  the  negro,  or- 
Col.  Rail  and  his  troops  were,  as  Washington  supposed  dered  him  to  carry  it  immediately  to  Col.  Rail.  Ex- 
they  would  be,  yet  under  the  influence  of  a  night's  ca-  cited  by  wine,  and  about  to  deal,  the  Colonel  thrust  the 
rousal  after  the  Christmas  holiday.  On  the  morning  of  note  into  his  pocket.  Like  the  Theban  polemarch, 
the  battle,  Rail  was  at  the  house  of  Abraham  Hunt,  who,  in  the  midst  of  a  convivial  party,  on  receiving  de- 
who  traded  with  friend  and  foe.  Hunt  was  some-  spatches  relative  to  a  conspiracy,  refused  to  open  them, 
times  suspected  of  being  a  Tory,  but  never  of  being  a  saying,  '  Business  to-morrow,'  Rail  did  not  look  at  the 
true  Whig.  He  had  invited  Col.  Rail  and  others  to  a  message,  but  continued  his  amusement.  Soon  after- 
Christmas  supper  at  his  house.  Cards  were  introduced,  wards  the  roll  of  the  American  drums  fell  upon  his  ear. 
and  play  continued  throughout  the  night,  accompanied.  The  rattle  of  musketry,  the  rumble  of  heavy  gun-car- 
with  wine-drinking.  A  negro  servant  was  kept  as  a  riages,  and  the  tramp  of  horses  aroused  his  appre- 
sort  if  porter  and  warden  at  the  door.  Just  at  dawn  hensions,  and  by  the  time  he  could  fly  to  his  quarters 
a  n.;ssenger  came  in  haste  with  a  note  to  Col.  Rail,  and  mount  his  horse,  the  Americans  were  driving  his 
sent  by  a  Tory  on  the  Pennington  road,  who  had  dis-  soldiers  before  them  like  chaff. 


HO  W  ROBER T  MORRIS  RAISED  MONEY.  32  7 

that  Christmas  night,  in  which  he  struck  the  grand  blow  at  Trenton,  and  in 
an  almost  bloodless  battle  won  such  fadeless  laurels  for  freedom,  he  became 
linked  in  the  minds  of  discerning  men  with  another,  and  a  far  more  exalted 
Being,  whose  birth  was  heralded  on  the  plains  of  Bethlehem  as  the  Prince  of 
Peace.  It  is  not  irreverent  to  mention  these  two  beloved  names  together. 
We  only  catch  the  refrain  of  the  note  we  struck  in  The  Opening  in  these 
words  : — '  I  hold  firmly  to  the  belief,  that  George  Washington  and  his  com- 
panions, with  the  Declaration  of  Independence  in  their  hands,  are  destined 
to  accomplish  for  the  political  redemption  of  mankind,  what  Jesus  Christ  and 
his  Apostles,  with  the  Gospel,  have  achieved  for  man's  spiritual  elevation.' 
From  the  night  which  in  seventeen  hundred  and  seventy-six,  followed  the 
anniversary  of  the  natal  day  of  the  Man  of  Nazareth  we  date  the  event  which 
introduced  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  human  liberty. 

Washington  crosses  the  Delaware  again,  and  fixes  his  Headquarters  at 
Trenton. — The  field  of  a  battle  won,  belongs  to  the  victor.  Having  secured 
the  immediate  fruits  of  his  victory,  Washington  again  passed  the  Delaware, 
and  established  his  headquarters  at  Trenton.  His  resources  were  lean,  his 
army  was  still  small ;  and  yet  within  five  days  one-half  of  it  would  melt  back 
into  the  towns  and  scattered  settlements  from  whence  it  had  been  gath- 
ered :  the  terms  of  enlistment  would  expire — sad  words,  but  not  to  be 
repeated  so  often  hereafter,  since  a  national  army  was  to  be  organized,  on 
which  the  commanding  general  could  rely.  Encumbered  as  Washington's 
victorious  men  were  with  a  thousand  prisoners,  and  nearly  disabled  as  most 
of  them  were  by  exposure  for  forty  hours  to  a  blinding  storm,  in  the  cutting 
hail  and  the  bitterest  cold,  with  little  food,  no  rest,  all  frost-bitten,  and  some 
of  them  frozen  to  death,  prudence  would  seem  to  have  dictated  repose.  But 
to  Washington's  heroic  spirit  there  was  now  no  safety  but  in  daring — no  salva- 
tion but  in  a  still  more  desperate  movement.  He  was  too  feeble  to  expose 
his  weakness.  It  was  safer  to  defy  the  enemy,  than  to  appear  to  dread  him. 
In  this  extreme  emergency,  one  reliance  upon  which  Washington  secretly 
depended,  did  not  fail.  In  anticipation  of  the  term  of  the  enlistment  of  the 
New  England  regiments  coming  to  an  end,  he  made  an  appeal  of  the  deepest 
earnestness  to  his  friend  Robert  Morris,  who  had  already  contributed  gener- 
ous aid,  for  further  and  instant  assistance.  Pennsylvania  had  promised  boun- 
ties to  her  undisciplined  volunteers  if  they  would  remain  six  weeks  longer,  and 
Washington  now  pledged  his  personal  honor  to  the  Eastern  veterans  for  the 
same  terms  ;  '  with  one  voice  they  instantly  gave  their  word  to  do  so,  making 
no  stipulations  of  their  own.'  The  paymaster's  last  dollar  was  gone.  No 
promise  of  Congress  to  pay  money  could  any  longer  inspire  confidence,  and 
the  printed  currency  was  no  longer  current.  Money  must  be  had.  Washington, 
Stark,  and  other  officers  pledged  their  own  fortunes.  But  this  could  not  work 
the  miracle  of  hard  cash  at  the  instant.-  'If  it  be  possible,  sir,'  wrote  the  Com- 
mander-in-chief, ■  to  give  us  assistance,  do  it ;  borrow  money  while  it  can  be 
done ;  we   are  doing  it  upon   our  private  credit.       Every  man  of  interest, 


328  WASHINGTON  CLOTHED  WITH  NEW  AUTHORITY. 

every  lover  of  his  country,  must  strain  his  credit  upon  such  an  occasion.  No 
time,  my  dear  sir,  is  to  be  lost.'  "Then  it  was  that  Robert  Morris  not 
only  evinced  his  faith  in  the  success  of  the  patriot  cause,  and  his  own  love 
of  country,  but  he  tested  the  strength  of  his  credit  and  mercantile  honor.  The 
sum  was  large,  and  the  requirement  seemed  almost  impossible  to  meet.  Gov- 
ernment credit  was  low,  but  confidence  in  Robert  Morris  was  unbounded. 
On  leaving  his  office,  musing  upon  how  he  should  obtain  the  money,  he  met  a 
wealthy  Quaker,  and  said,  ■  I  want  money  for  the  use  of  the  army.'  'Robert, 
what  security' can' st  thou  give,'  asked  the  Quaker.  '  My  note  and  my  honor/ 
promptly  replied  Morris.  ■  Thou  shalt  have  it,'  as  promptly  responded  the 
lender.'  "  1  In  a  few  hours  the  sum  of  fifty  thousand  dollars,  in  hard  money, 
was  in  Washington's  hands,  and  the  man  who  never  broke  his  word  through  a 
life  time,  had  redeemed  his  pledge. 

Congress  nobly  meets  the  Emergency. — Its  decisive  action  was  the  more  to 
be  praised,  for  it  was  in  the  midst  of  the  gloomiest  forebodings  that  they  had 
adjourned  to  Baltimore ;  and  on  the  very  day  the  victory  of  Trenton  was 
being  won,  they  had  appointed  Richard  Henry  Lee,  and  Samuel  Adams  a 
committee  to  report  what  action  should  be  had  in  the  solemn  crisis.  On 
the  following  day  Congress  determined  that,  'having  maturely  considered  the 
present  crisis,  and  having  perfect  reliance  on  the  wisdom,  vigor,  and  upright- 
ness of  General  Washington,  resolved  that,  in  addition  to  the  eighty-eight 
battalions  to  be  furnished  by  the  separate  States,  he  shall,  as  the  General  of 
the  United  States,  raise,  organize,  and  officer  sixteen  battalions  of  infantry, 
three  thousand  light  horsemen,  three  regiments  of  artillery,  and  a  corps  of 
engineers.'  The  general,  thus  made  in  fact  what  he  had  hitherto  been  only 
by  courtesy — Commander-in-chief, — could  enlist  men  from  the  whole  country ; 
displace  all  incompetent  officers,  and  commission  new  ones  under  the  rank 
of  brigadier-generals ;  filling  vacancies,  and  appropriating  necessaries  for  the 
use  of  the  army  at  a  just  appraisal. 

Washington  not  a  Dictator. — This  action  was  misunderstood  at  the  time, 
and  has  been  misunderstood  ever  since.  Congress  was  accused  by  the  Tories 
of  America,  and  by  our  enemies  in  Europe,  of  creating  a  dictator ;  and  this 
was  so  persistently  reiterated,  that  the  cause  of  Republicanism  itself  was 
seriously  hurt.  But  Congress  meant  to  confer  no  such  honors,  nor  did  Wash- 
ington so  understand  it.  Even  where  he  arrested  disaffected  persons,  as  any 
commanding  general  in  actual  warfare  always  may,  he  was  required  to  account 
to  the  civil  authorities  of  the  States  where  they  belonged.  To  this  grant  of 
powers,  not   before   conferred,  Washington  immediately   replied :  '  All   my 

1  Robert    Morris  was  a  native  of  England,  where  mental  in  establishing  a  national  bank.     After  the  war 

he  was  born  in  1733.      He  came  to  America  in  1744,  and  he  was  a  state  legislator,  and  Washington  wished  him 

became  a  merchant's  clerk  in  Philadelphia.     By  the  to  be  his  first  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  but  he  declined 

force  of  industry,  energy,  and  good  character,  he  rose  it.     By  land  speculations  he  lost  his  fortune,  and  died 

to  the  station  of  one  of  the  first  merchants  of  his  time,  in  comparative  poverty,  in  May,   1806,  when  a  little 

He  was    a   signer  of  the  Declaration     of    Indepen-  more  than  seventy  years  of  age. — Lossing's  His.  of 

dence,  and  was  active   as  a  public  financier  through-  the  U.  S.,  p.  263. 
out  the  war.     Toward."  its  close — 1781 — he  was  instru- 


$ 


WASHINGTON  CONCENTRATES  ALL  HIS  FORCES.  329 

1 

faculties  shall  be  employed  to  advance  those  objects,  and  only  those,  which 
gave  rise  to  this  distinction.  If  my  exertions  should  not  be  attended  with 
success,  I  trust  the  failure  will  be  imputed  to  the  difficulties  I  have  to  combat, 
rather  than  to  a  want  of  zeal  for  my  country,  and  the  closest  attention  to  her 
interests.  Instead  of  thinking  myself  freed  from  all  civil  obligations  by  this 
mark  of  confidence,  I  shall  constantly  bear  in  mind,  that  as  the  sword  was  the 
last  resort  for  the  preservation  of  our  liberties,  so  it  ought  to  be  laid  aside 
when  those  liberties  are  firmly  established.  I  shall  instantly  set  about  making 
the  most  necessary  reforms  in  the  army.'  This  letter  was  written  on  New 
Year's  day,  1777,  from  a  camp  where  less  than  seven  hundred  effective  and 
reliable  men  answered  to  the  roll-call. 

Cornwallis  with  seven  thousand  Veterans  marches  on  Trenton. — Recalled 
suddenly  by  the  astounding  news  of  the  capture  of  the  Hessians,  Cornwallis 
postponed  his  pleasure-trip  home,  and  at  the  head  of  a  corps  of  seven  thousand 
of  the  best  troops  in  the  British  army,  marched  on  Trenton,  '  determined  to 
wipe  out  the  late  mortifying  disgrace,  rescue  the  victor's  prey,  and  by  a  single 
overwhelming  blow,  annihilate  the  rebels.'  To  all  human  foresight,  that  fate 
could  be  averted  only  by  a  cowardly  flight,  which  would  be  but  another  name 
for  destruction.  But  the  hopes  of  Independence  were  on  the  eastern  shore 
of  the  Delaware,  and  Washington  stood  undismayed  amidst  the  dwindled 
band  of  its  champions.  Through  the  clouds  that  drifted  over  their  heads,  the 
eye  of  faith  could  discern  the  arm  of  everlasting  justice  that  swayed  the  for- 
tunes of  the  struggling  Colonies  ;  and  while  on  the  sightless  couriers  of  that 
December  air,  the  wild  storms  of  winter  were  drifting,  the  ear  of  patriotism 
could  hear  the  many  voices  of  Eternal  Liberty. 

Washington  concentrates  all  his  Forces  to  meet  the  Enemy. — The  old 
order  of  things  had  passed  away  j  a  new  and  more  efficient  regime  came 
in.  Despatches  now  carried  orders  and  not  advice,  and  those  orders  were 
obeyed  with  alacrity  and  delight.  Cadwalader  ■  hastened  from  Crosswick's 
with  eighteen  hundred  troops  on  the  first  of  January ;  and  by  a  forced  march 
the  next  night,  Mifflin  came  in  with  a  like  number  from  Bordentown,  making 
an  army  of.  five  thousand  men.  They  amounted  to  very  little  in  the  opinion 
of  Cornwallis,  to  whom  news  of  every  movement  of  the  patriots  was  instantly 
carried  by  the  disloyal  who  swarmed  all  through  the  region  ;  but  before  many 
days,  that  brave  and  accomplished  but  somewhat  self-confident  soldier,  was 
to  have  abundant  occasion  to  change  his  opinion.  In  truth,  that  motley  mass 
did  not  present  a  very  soldierly  appearance,  for  more  than  half  of  them  were 
farmers,  merchants,  and  mechanics,  who  knew  nothing  of  war,  and  had  hastily 
left  their  family  firesides  with  all  the  comforts  of  home,  for  the  hardships  and 

1  John  Cadwalader  was  born  in  Philadelphia  in  1743,  the  battles  of  Princeton,    Brandywine,   Germanrown, 

and   died   Feb.  10,  1786.      He  was  a  member  of  the  and  Monmouth.      He  fought  a  duel  with  Gen.  Con- 

Pennsylvania  Convention  in  1775,  and  at  the  commence-  way  on  account  of  his  intrigues  against  Gen.  Wash« 

ment  of  the  war  was  commander  of  a  volunteer  com-  ington,  and  was,  after  the  war,  a-  member  of  the  As- 

pany,  nearly  all  the  members  of  which   subsequently  sembly  of  Maryland.—  Aj>j>letoris  Cyclopedia:  Title* 

became  officers  of  the  army.     In  1777  he  was  appoint-  Cadwalader*  John. 
ed  by  Congress  a  brigadier-general,  and  took  part  in 


33°  NIGHT  FLIGHT  FROM  TRENTON. 

perils  of  a  winter  campaign.     But  they  all  knew  something  of  the  use  of  fire- 
arms,  and  to  a  man  they  were  veterans  in  patriotism. 

The  Night  Flight  from  Trenton  to  win  a  Victory  at  Princeton. — All 
through  the  war  our  great  leader  had  to  make  up  in  generalship,  what  he  lack* 
ed  in  munitions  and  men.  One  of  his  most  rapid  and  superb  movements  was 
made  on  the  second  night  of  the  year  1777.  Leaving  a  strong  rear-guao-d  at 
Princeton,  Cornwallis  reached  Trenton  on  the  evening  of  that  day,  after  a 
hard  march  of  ten  miles  over  roads  made  deep  by  a  winter  thaw,  and  his  ad- 
vance was  impeded  by  a  succession  of  hard  skirmishes  with  detachments 
thrown  out  by  Washington  to  harass  his  columns.  At  dark  both  armies 
found  themselves  encamped  on  opposite  sides  of  the  narrow  Assanpink, 
which  flows  through  the  town.  The  main  British  body  bivouacked  on  the 
rising  ground  above  the  town,  while  strong  pickets  were  posted  along  the 
stream  to  watch  closely  every  movement  of  the  Americans  behind  their 
breastworks,  which  had  been  thrown  up  within  pistol-shot,  and  apparently  with 
a  view  to  meet  the  enemy.  Cornwallis  was  advised  by  one  of  his  principal 
officers,  to  bring  on  an  engagement  at  once  ;  but  he  could  not  believe  Wash- 
ington would  try  to  escape.  Tory  spies  could  only  report  what  they  saw 
and  knew ;  they  neither  saw  nor  knew  the  secret  purposes  of  the  American 
leader.  Towards  midnight  he  told  his  council  of  war  his  plan.  It  was  by 
a  sudden  movement  to  turn  Cornwallis'  left,  fall  on  his  rear-guard  at  Prince- 
ton, and  try  to  capture  the  enemy's  military  stores  at  Brunswick.  He  had 
already — just  after  dark — started  all  the  army  baggage  noiselessly  over  the  soft 
road  to  Burlington.  He  knew  every  by-road  throughout  the  neighborhood, 
and  watching  the  skies  carefully  saw  signs  of  a  sudden  change  of  the  weather, 
which  if  it  came  in  time,  would  probably  enable  him  to  carry  away  his  field- 
pieces  safely  over  the  frozen  ground.  By  midnight  that  sudden  change  had 
come — the  ground  was  stiff,  and  his  army  began  to  move  in  detachments  by 
*  a  roundabout  road '  towards  Princeton.  '  To  conceal  the  movement,  guards 
were  left  to  replenish  the  American  camp-fires.  The  night  had  as  yet  no 
light  in  the  unmeasured  firmament,  but  the  stars  .as  they  sparkled  through  the 
openings  in  the  clouds  j  the  fires  of  the  British  blazed  round  the  hills  on 
which  they  slumbered  ;  the  beaming  fires  of  the  Americans  rose  in  a  wall  of 
flame  along  the  Assanpink,  for  more  than  half  a  mile,  impervious  to  the 
eye,  throwing  a  glare  on  the  town,  the  rivulet,  the  tree-tops,  the  river  and 
the  background.  The  drowsy  British  officer  who  had  charge  of  the  night- 
watch,  let  the  flames  blaze  up  and  subside  under  fresh  heaps  of  fuel,  and  saw 
nothing,  and  surmised  nothing.'  ■ 

Discovery  of  the  Deserted  Camp  of  the  Americans. — When  the  British 
commander  was  told  the  next  morning  that  nothing  was  left  of  the  American 
camp  but  the  smouldering  ashes  of  its  watch-fires,  and  whither  they  had  fled  no 
one  could  tell,  nothing  could  exceed  his  mortification,  or  solve  the  mystery, 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  247. 


THE  BATTLE  OF  PRINCETON.  331 

till  the  booming  of  cannon  on  the  still,  clear  winter  air,  from  the  direction  of 
Princeton,  smote  his  ear.  *  Is  that  thunder  ? '  '  No,  General,'  answered 
Erskine,  'it  is  Washington's  cannon  playing  on  our  rear-guard.'  'What  will 
become  of  our  stores  at  Brunswick  ?  To  arms  ! '  And  his  army  was  quickly 
formed  into  marching  columns. 

The  Battle  of  Princeton. — A  hard  night's  march,  by  a  circuitous  route  of 
eighteen  miles,  brought  the  Americans  to  the  southeastern  skirts  of  Princeton 
at  sunrise,  too  late  for  a  complete  surprise.  Mercer,  with  four  hundred  men, 
was  sent  to  destroy  the  bridge  over  Stony  Brook  on  the  direct  road  to 
Trenton.  But,  although  the  British  were  already  on  their  march  to  join  Corn- 
wallis,  they  turned  to  meet  the  pursuers,  and  an  engagement  followed  ;  and 
as  both  parties  were  about  equal  in  numbers  and  field-pieces,  the  ground  was 
fiercely  contested.  The  first  strife  was  for  a  commanding  range  of  high 
ground  to  the  north,  where,  after  a  short  but  brisk  cannonade,  the  Americans 
scaled  the  fences,  and  opened  with  their  muskets  and  rifles.  After  one  return 
volley,  the  English  charged  with  their  bayonets ;  and  as  most  of  the  Americans 
were  armed  only  with  rifles,  they  gave  way  and  abandoned  their  cannon.  But 
their  officers  attempted  to  arrest  the  retreat,  and  stood  bravely  till  most  of  the 
leaders  fell — Haslet,  of  Delaware ;  Fleming,  of  Virginia ;  Neal,  in  command 
of  the  artillery ;  and  noblest  perhaps  of  all,  the  gallant  General  Mercer,  who 
reeled  from  his  dying  horse  only  to  be  stabbed  by  many  bayonets.  But  on 
hearing  the  first  gun,  Washington  started  on  a  flying  march,  and  reached  the 
field  only  to  find  Mercer's  division  in  retreat.  At  a  glance  he  saw  where  to 
strike.  While  a  well-directed  fire  from  his  two  pieces  of  artillery  stopped  the 
advance  of  the  foremost  British  column,  he  arrested  the  retreat  of  Mercer's 
battalions,  and  bringing  them  once  more  into  line,  held  the  united  forces 
steady  for  a  general  engagement.  The  moment  having  come  to  win  or  lose 
the  day,  he  resorted  to  the  desperate,  but"  only  means  which  ever  availed 
with  his  raw  levies  against  the  unwavering  obstinacy  of  British  regulars — he 
dashed  to  the  front,  and  led  the  charge  himself  to  within  thirty  yards  of  the 
enemy,  when  volleys  from  both  sides  renewed  the  fight  with  deadly  fierceness. 
As  the  clouds  of  smoke  rose  and  were  almost  instantly  dissolved  in  the  frosty 
air,  the  eyes  of  the  Americans  eagerly  sought  the  spot  where  they  had  last 
seen  their  general,  and  as  his  majestic  form  was  unveiled  to  their  gaze,  still 
firmly  seated  on  his  well-known  battle-horse  fronting  the  foe,  as  he  waved  his 
sword  a  wild  cheer  rang  over  the  field.  The  spectacle  seemed  for  a  moment 
to  excite  the  same  amazement  in  both  armies ;  they  felt  that  a  higher  than 
human  power  shielded  the  patriot  leader.  His  waving  sword  flashed  back  in 
the  morning  sun-blaze  the  answering  signal,  and  nerved  the  ranks  of  the 
fresh  volunteers  with  the  steadiness  of  accustomed  campaign  valor.  He  was 
everywhere  on  the  field,  directing  every  movement  with  rapidity  and  match- 
less dexterity.  Neither  the  skill  of  the  hostile  commander,  nor  the  courage  and 
discipline  of  his  troops,  could  avail  against  the  onset  of  such  men.  They  had 
to  give  way.     The  shattered  regiments  broke  and  fled :    their  deserted  can- 


332  WINTER  QUARTERS  A T  MORRISTOWN. 

non  began  to  grow  cold ;  the  officer  in  command  was  pursued  for  four  miles, 
and  many  of  his  men  taken.  After  Washington  came  up,  the  conflict  lasted  but 
twenty  minutes  :  but  the  English  fell  like  tall  grain  before  the  reaper.  Two 
hundred  lay  dead  or  bleeding  on  the  field,  and  before  noon  a  still  larger  num- 
ber were  brought  in  prisoners,  fourteen  of  whom  were  British  officers.  The 
American  loss  was  surprisingly  small,  except  of  officers,1  whose  cool  intrepidity, 
and  noble  devotion  inspired  the  young  army  with  a  still  higher  feeling  of  sol- 
dierly confidence,  and  the  whole  nation  with  fresh  enthusiasm. 

Cornwallis  reaches  Princeton  too  late. — Disappointment  and  chagrin  now 
seemed  to  overtake  the  gifted  Cornwallis  at  every  step.  Even  his  forced 
march  of  ten  miles  by  the  direct  road,  brought  him  to  Princeton  only  in  time 
to  see  the  rear  of  the  Americans  in  orderly  retreat  beyond  the  town,  carrying 
with  them  their  own  wounded  and  dead,  and  in  addition  to  their  baggage,  the 
prisoners,  booty,  and  trophies  of  triumph.  A  bolder  commander  might  have 
hotly  pursued  an  encumbered  fugitive  army,  exhausted  by  constant  marching, 
watching,  or  fighting,  without  sleep  or  shelter,  or  sufficient  food  for  more  than 
forty  hours.  But  he  began  to  entertain  a  salutary  dread  of  the  military  genius 
of  the  American  general,  while  his  trained  regulars  no  longer  '  affected  the  con- 
tempt which  they  had  early  imbibed  from  their  officers,  for  a  mob  of  ununi- 
formed  rebels.'  Perhaps  both  of  these  things  had  something  to  do  with  his 
lordship's  decision.  It  seems  that  he  preferred  to  send  on  a  force  to  protect 
his  stores  at  Brunswick,  and  look  about  him  to  see  if  he  should  be  able  to 
hold  even  what  he  had  gained  in  a  single  narrow  State  at  so  great  a  sacrifice 
of  time,  men,  and  treasure,  and  regain  what  he  put  a  far  higher  estimate  upon 
— his  prestige  for  generalship. 

Washington  establishes  his  Winter  Quarters  at  Morristown. — Although  he 
was  strongly  inclined  to  attempt  the  destruction  of  the  enemy's  stores  at 
Brunswick,  yet  his  humanity  towards  the  brave  men  who  had  done  so  well, 
and  were  still  suffering  so  much,  overruled  his  original  purpose.  Of  the  extent 
of  that  suffering  and  destitution,  we  can  realize  little  from  the  facts  already 
recorded.  Washington's  letters  describing  the  condition  of  his  soldiers,  are 
more  than  confirmed  by  the  pictures  drawn  by  English  and  German  officers 
who  were  prisoners  in  the  American  camp,  all  of  whom  had  been  strangers  to 
such  privations.  They  wrote  at  the  time  : — '  Very  many  of  them  marched 
barefoot  great  distances  over  rough,  frozen  ground,  and  through  snow  with 
bleeding  feet.  Few  have  warm  clothes  :  blankets  are  almost  unknown  :  they 
have  few  tents,  and  lie  down  on  the  frozen  ground  to  sleep,  seeming  to  look  for 
but  one  comfort — a  fire  to  warm  their  feet  by.  We  never  knew  an  army  that 
would  think  of  such  privations  without  mutiny.  And  yet  these  republican 
soldiers  never  complain,  although  they  have  all  of  them  had  comfortable, 
and  many  of  them  even  luxurious  homes.  It  will  be  very  hard  to  conquer 
such  men — yes,  impossible.' 

1  Mercer,  who  was  mortally  wounded,  stood  in  merit    disposition,  and  love  for  his  adopted  county,  was  fitted 
next  to  Greene,  and  by  his  education,  abilities,  willing    fo.-  high  trusts. — Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  249. 


IMMENSE  RESULTS  OF  A  BRIEF  CAMPAIGN.  333 

After  passing  the  Millstone  river,  and  destroying  the  bridge  at  Kingston, 
Washington  turned  off  to  the  highlands,  where  the  exhausted  army  '  sank  down 
for  the  night  in  the  woods  around  Somerset  Court  House,  on  the  bare,  frozen 
ground,  and  fell  asleep  without  thinking  of  the  cold.'  The  next  day — 
January  6 — they  rose  with  alacrity  to  the  reveille,  and  marched  on  in  a  solid 
column  to  Morristown,  which  was  to  be  the  quarters  of  the  Commander-in- 
chief.  In  that  town  and  in  the  neighboring  villages,  the  troops  were  to  find 
shelter,  and  learn  the  life  and  discipline  of  the  regular  soldier. 

New  Jersey  almost  Redeemed. — Meantime  there  was  to  be  no  cessation 
from  activity  till  the  enemy  had  been  driven  from  the  interior  of  the  State, 
and  forced  back  to  his  strongholds  on  the  coast  from  which  he  had  started. 
Late  successes  had  greatly  strengthened  the  popular  cause.  The  timid  had 
grown  bold,  and  the  patriotic  daring.  Eevrywhere  armed  men  seemed  to 
spring  up  from  the  bosom  of  the  soil.  The  enemy  was  harassed  from  all 
quarters.  Foraging  parties  were  surrounded  and  cut  to  pieces,  or  compelled 
to  surrender  with  their  spoils.  Four  hundred  raw  troops  flocked  to  General 
Dickinson's  standard,  forded  the  Millstone,  and  swept  a  strong  marauding 
band  from  the  neighborhood,  taking  many  of  them  prisoners,  and  capturing 
forty  army  wagons,  and  large  droves  of  horned  cattle  and  sheep,  with  a  hun- 
dred English  draft  breed  horses.  Washington's  outposts  stretched  to  within 
sight  of  Amboy,  which  was  almost  the  last  point  the  English  held  in  New 
Jersey  beyond  the  Bay  of  New  York  ;  and  feeble  as  was  the  American  army, 
it  was  secure  behind  the  formidable  barricades  of  frozen  rivers,  dense  forests, 
and  ranges  of  snow-covered  hills. 

The  Results  of  the  late  victorious  Campaign. — They  were  great  and  in- 
spiring. In  the  military  annals  of  illustrious  Captains,  few  fairer  pages  have 
been  written,  than  the  record  of  the  ten  days  which  opened  with  the  capture 
of  Rail's  Hessian  army  at  Trenton  on  the  night  of  Christmas,  and  ended  in 
the  arrival  at  their  winter  quarters  at  Morristown,  on  the  evening  of  the  fifth 
of  January,  of  the  victors  of  Princeton.  During  this  brief  campaign  with  one 
army  on  the  eve  of  being  disbanded,  and  another  of  raw  troops  just  recruited, 
Washington  had,  in  the  depth  of  a  rigorous  winter,  crossed  a  broad,  deep  river — 
angry  with  black  water  and  crowded  with  masses  of  floating  ice-cakes — marched 
six  hours  through  a  bewildering  night  storm  of  snow  and  hail — surprised  and 
captured  an  army  of  brutal  and  ferocious  Hessian  mercenaries — recrossed 
that  same  terrible  stream,  rolling  a  flood  like  the  Danube,  carrying  with  them 
prisoners  and  booty  to  a  place  of  security — sent  the  greater  portion  of  his 
troops  to  their  homes,  and  with  but  a  few  remaining  hundred,  passed  that  rag- 
ing river  for  the  third  time — recruited  a  new  army  in  hours  which  other  gene- 
rals would  have  demanded  weeks  for — flanked  an  overwhelming  corps  of  the 
best  troops  in  the  world,  and  stealing  away  so  noiselessly  that  the  sleeping 
commander  only  knew  he  had  escaped  him  by  the  discovery  the  next  morn- 
ing of  a  deserted  camp,  whose  fires  were  still  burning ;  not  knowing  whithei 


334  ITS  EFFECTS  AT  HOME  AND  ABROAD. 

he  had  fled,  till  the  sound  of  his  cannon  from  a  distance  of  ten  miles,  told  him 
that  his  army  had  been  flanked  by  a  long  and  circuitous  night  march  of  his 
antagonist,  who  had  engaged  his  rear-guard,  cutting  whole  regiments  of  them 
to  pieces,  capturing  several  hundred  and  putting  the  rest  to  flight — retreating 
from  the  field  within  an  hour,  and  carrying  his  prey  with  him  in  a  march  so 
orderly  and  rapid  that  pursuit  was  hopeless — reaching  his  impregnable  winter 
quarters  among  the  frozen  hills — all  with  but  a  handful  of  undisciplined  re- 
cruits, half-fed,  half-clothed,  half-armed,  half-frozen — and  that  these  prodigies 
of  strategy  and  valor,  should  have  been  crowded  in  the  brief  span  of  two  hun- 
dred and  forty  hours  !  To  this  day  it  reads  more  like  a  fancy  sketch  of  ro- 
mance, than  the  unvarnished  record  of  history. 

Its  Effect  on  the  Country. — The  news  had  been  spreading  day  by  day 
through  the  disheartened  colonies  with  the  swiftness  of  couriers,  and  the 
power  of  inspiration.  Every  man  who  told  his  neighbor  of  it,  began  by  say- 
ing— '  Great  news  from  the  Jerseys.'  It  passed  into  a  proverb,  and  familiar 
ized  millions  of  men  with  the  great  qualities  of  the  leader  of  the  patriot  cause, 
and  the  heroic  achievements  of  the  Continental  soldiers. 

Everything  had  been  lost — everything  was  now  won.  Those  last,  dark, 
cold,  gloomy  days  of  December,  which  had  covered  the  earth  with  the  wind- 
ing-sheet of  winter,  and  buried  her  till  the  resurrection  of  spring,  were  days 
of  gladness  and  triumph.  When  the  news  of  the  victory  of  Trenton  reached 
Congress,  the  President,  who  attempted  to  communicate  it  to  that  body, 
broke  in  his  utterances.  At  last  he  said :  ■  The  Secretary  will  read  Wash- 
ington's despatch.'  It  was  written  in  no  mood  of  exultation,  but  it  breathed 
the  conscious  spirit  of  faith  in  God,  and  confidence  in  the  justice  and  ulti- 
mate triumph  of  the  national  cause. 

Its  Effect  in  Europe. — When  the  intelligence  of  the  campaign  reached 
England,  and  spread  over  Europe,  military  men  who  studied  its  details,  be- 
gan to  criticise  somewhat  severely  the  conduct  of  veteran  English  generals, 
for  allowing  a  rebel  who  had  at  best  been  known  only  as  a  forest  campaigner, 
with  a  few  straggling,  half-clothed,  half-armed,  half-fed  republicans,  to  foil  the 
designs,  escape  the  stratagems,  and  defy  the  power  of  the  best  army  on 
the  earth.  The  great  Frederic  of  Prussia  was  then  founding  a  state,  which 
during  the  same  first  hundred  years  of  our  national  life,  has  grown  into  one 
of  the  most  powerful  of  kingdoms.  He  traced  the  progress  of  the  American 
struggle  with  the  minutest  care,  and  with  the  most  reliable  information.  He 
was  the  first  of  the  great  soldiers  of  Europe,  to  discern  the  military  genius 
of  Washington  : — ( This  young  American  general,'  he  said,  '  is  opening  a  new 
chapter  in  the  art  of  war.  England  has  no  man  to  match  him.'  The  world 
then  began  to  fix  its  gaze  upon  what  has  since  become  the  Great  Republic 
But  no  eyes  were  fixed  with  deeper  intensity  than  those  of  the  young  Mar- 
quis of  Lafayette.  As  soon  as  the  news  reached  Paris,  he  flew  to  Deane, 
who  read  to  him  the  despatches. 


HOW  WASHINGTON  DEALT  WITH  TORIES.  335 

Dealing  with  Tories. — As  the  shadows  thickened  around  the  national 
cause,  and  all  but  the  stoutest  hearts  began  to  quail,  the  second  proclamation 
of  the  brothers  Howe  was  scattered  broadcast  over  the  country,  and  the  dis- 
loyal, the  timid,  and  the  base,  everywhere  hastened  to  declare  their  allegiance 
to  the  British  king.  Eight  hundred  and  fifty  in  Rhode  Island,  where  the 
English  had  gained  a  temporary  foothold  without  serious  opposition  ;  twelve 
hundred  and  eighty  in  the  city  and  rural  districts  of  New  York,  and  two 
thousand  seven  hundred  in  New  Jersey  had,  in  a  short  time,  subscribed  the 
formal  declaration  of  fidelity.  Washington  had  in  the  meantime  gained  two 
brilliant,  and  to  all  recreant  Americans,  astounding  victories;  and  he  was 
clothed  with  authority  to  speak  in  behalf  of  the  nation.  On  the  25th  of  Jan- 
uary he  promulgated  an  order  from  ■  Headquarters  of  the  Army  of  the  United 
States,'  demanding  that  '  all  persons  who  had  accepted  British  protection 
should  withdraw  within  the  enemy's  lines,  or  take  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  the 
United  States  of  America.'  This  bold  and  peremptory  order  struck  terror 
into  every  Tory  heart  in  New  Jersey,  and  inspired  the  soul  of  every  patriot 
who  read  the  proclamation,  or  heard  the  news.  The  change  which  so  sud- 
denly came  over  the  Jersey  people  has  been  well  described :  '  The  indis- 
criminate rapacity  of  the  British  army,  which  spared  neither  friend  nor  foe  ; 
the  terrible  excesses  of  their  lust,  the  unrestrained  passion  for  destruction, 
changed  the  people  of  New  Jersey  from  spectators  of  the  war, — so  supine  that 
no  more  than  a  hundred  of  them  had  joined  Washington  in  his  retreat, — to 
active  partisans,  animated  by  the  zeal  and  courage  which  exasperation  at 
personal  injuries,  the  love  of  liberty  and  property,  the  regard  for  the  sanctity 
of  home,  and  the  impulse  to  avenge  wrong,  could  inspire.'  The  same  faithful 
historic  pen  draws  the  narrow  limits  within  which  the  British  power  found 
itself  circumscribed  at  the  opening  of  the  third  year  of  the  attempt  of  the 
Empire  to  extinguish  the  light  of  the  rising  Republic  of  the  West :  '  New 
England,  except  the  island  of  Rhode  Island;  all  central,  northern,  and  west- 
ern New  York,  except  Fort  Niagara ;  all  the  country  from  the  Delaware  to 
Florida,  were  free  from  the  invaders,  who  had  acquired  only  the  islands  that 
touched  New  York  harbor,  and  a  few  adjacent  outposts,  of  which  Brunswick 
and  the  hills  round  Kingsbridge,  were  the  most  remote.  For  future  opera- 
tions, they  had  against  them  the  vast  extent  of  the  coast,  and  in  the  forest, 
which  was  ever  recurring  between  the  settlements  whenever  they  passed  be- 
yond their  straitened  quarters,  they  were  exposed  to  surprises,  skirmishes,  and 
nardships.  They  were  wasted  by  incessant  alarms  and  unremitting  labor ; 
their  forage  and  provisions  were  purchased  at  the  price  of  blood.'  ' 

Washington' s  Character  begins  to  be  Appreciated. — Some  cavils  were 
raised  by  ambitious  and  captious  men  in  and  out  of  Congress.  But  the  grow- 
ing feeling  of  the  country  was  better  represented  by  such  sagacious  and  gen- 
erous men  as  Richard  Henry  Lee,  who  spoke  of  Washington  in  those  days  much 
as  men  dp  now ;  and  Robert  Morris,  who,  in  writing  to  his  friend,  William 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  254. 


336  WASHINGTON  AND  FRANKLIN  AT  CHRISTMAS, 

Hooper,  the  Congressional  delegate  from  North  Carolina,  exclaimed  :  '  He  is 
the  greatest  man  on  earth,'  and  received  in  reply  the  following  words,  which 
forecast  the  awards  of  the  future  :  ■  Will  posterity  believe  the  tale  ?  When  it 
shall  be  consistent  with  policy  to  give  the  history  of  that  man  from  his  first 
introduction  into  our  service;  how  often  America  has  been  rescued  from 
ruin  by  the  mere  strength  of  his  genius,  conduct,  and  courage,  encountering 
every  obstacle  that  want  of  money,  men,  army,  ammunition,  could  throw  in 
his  way,  an  impartial  world  will  say  with  you,  that  he  is  the  greatest  man  on 
earth.  Misfortunes  are  the  element  in  which  he  shines  ;  they  are  the  ground- 
work on  which  his  picture  appears  to  the  greatest  advantage.  He  rises  su- 
perior to  them  all ;  they  serve  as  foils  to  his  fortitude,  and  as  stimulants  to 
bring  into  view  those  great  qualities  which  his  modesty  keeps  concealed.  I 
could  fill  my  letter  with  his  praise  ;  but  anything  I  can  say  cannot  equal  his 
merits.'  Through  all  the  records  of  opinion  of  those  times,  we  everywhere 
find  indications  that  it  was  gradually  becoming  the  general  conviction,  that 
in  the  essential  greatness  of  his  military  genius,  in  his  broad  and  illuminated 
statesmanship,  in  his  matchless  self-control,  in  the  indomitable  courage, 
strength,  and  purity  of  his  character,  the  chief  hope  of  the  Republic  reposed. 

Distant  Scenes  brought  together. — We  left,our  goodly  city  of  New  York 
gay  with  festivities  in  honor  of  the  investiture  of  Sir  William  Howe  as  Knight 
of  the  Bath.  The  town  was  lit  up  by  a  general  illumination.  From  private 
dwellings,  and  the  fort  on  the  battery,  lights  were  flashing  over  the  waters, 
and  rockets  of  many  colors  were  shooting  into  the  winter  sky.  The  heavy  re- 
verberations from  guns  of  the  English  men-of-war  were  rolling  ceaselessly 
over  the  broad  bay.  The  headquarters  of  the  commander-in-chief  of  his 
majesty's  forces  in  North  America,  with  the  new  order  won  by  his  late  brilliant 
victories  on  his  breast,  were  blazing  with  a  splendor  hitherto  unknown  on 
these  rude  shores.  While  the  happy  recipient  of  this  dazzling  emblem  of 
royal  favor,  was  surrounded  by  whatever  of  beauty  and  chivalry  the  court 
capitol  could  gather,  and 

•  The  lamps  shone  o'er  fair  women  and  b^ave  men, 
And  all  went  merry  as  a  marriage- bell  - — 

Washington  with  his  patriot  army  was  crossing  the  Delaware,  and  before  the 
next  morning's  daybreak  had  ended  the  revelry,  messengers  on  fleet  horses 
were  riding  hard  with  the  news  that  the  Hessian  army  was  captured  and  that 
its  commander  lay  dying  at  Trenton. 

Franklin  spending  his  Christmas  at  Paris. — After  a  stormy  passage,  in 
which  his  good  little  ship  had  taken  three  English  prizes,  Franklin  reached 
France,  and  entered  Paris — December  21st, — four  days  before  the  victory  of 
Trenton  had  shot  the  first  gleam  of  light  through  the  darkness  which  wrapped 
the  infant  Republic.  His  fame  as  a  scientist  had  long  filled  Europe,  and 
he  was  regarded  as  the  greatest  man  America  had  produced.  His  arrival 
created  universal  astonishment.     'He  has  fled  for  safety  from  an  expiring 


PREPARATIONS  FOR  THE  CAMPAIGN  01   1777.  337 

cause  : '  '  He  has  come  back  to  make  the  best  terms  he  can  for  his  rebel 
countrymen.'  Such  was  the  language  of  the  government  and  press  of  Eng- 
land. Edmund  Burke,  in  whose  noble  soul  no  mean  suspicion  ever  found 
shelter,  indignantly  exclaimed  : — ■  It  cannot  be  true  ;  I  will  never  believe  that 
he  is  going  to  end  a  long  life,  every  hour  of  which  has  been  brightened  with 
grand  achievement,  by  so  foul  and  dishonorable  a  flight !'  At  Nantes,  Frank- 
lin had  dropped  a  few  words,  which  flew  through  Europe,  carrying  with  them 
a  weight  greater  than  the  utterances  of  any  other  private  man  living.  '  By  no 
means,  gentlemen  !  Our  cause  is  neither  desperate,  nor  discouraging.  A  score 
of  successful  English  campaigns  could  not  subjugate  the  Americans.  -The 
Declaration  of  Independence  was  not  blotted  out  by  the  battle  of  Long  Island 
— that  great  act  is  irrevocable.  We  are  winning  our  liberty,  we  shall  found 
a  free  State,  and  France  is  our  natural  ally.'  Beyond  this  it  was  needless  to 
go.  On  the  evening  of  Lord  Howe's  festivities  in  New  York,  and  Washing- 
ton's night  battle  at  Trenton,  Franklin  was  holding  councils  in  a  secluded 
apartment  in  Paris,  with  Silas  Deane,  and  a  few  confidential  friends — the 
theme  being  the  one  which  lay  nearest  their  hearts — how  to  win  the  Govern- 
ment of  Louis  XVI.  to  the  American  cause.  The  future  will  show  with  what 
results. 

The  Winter  of  Preparation  for  the  Spring  Campaign — Washington  at 
Morristown. — The  organization  of  the  national  army  now  began,  and  was 
prosecuted  with  vigor  and  steadiness.  For  the  first  time,  officers  learned  sub- 
ordination to  one  supreme  chief,  and  were  taught  discipline.  A  line  of  small 
cantonments  was  planted  from  Princeton  to  the  Highlands  of  the  Hudson, 
and  light  expeditions  were  scouring  the  country  in  all  directions,  till  the 
harassed  foe  was  glad  to  abandon  the  interior,  and  withdraw  the  last  foraging 
party  within  the  lines  at  Brunswick  and  Amboy,  from  whence  no  offensive 
movements  were  made  till  far  into  the  following  spring.  A  new  aspect  was 
presented  throughout  the  State.  The  lines  were  pretty  clearly  drawn  be- 
tween Tories  and  Whigs ;  volunteers  were  constantly  recruiting  the  regular 
service,  and  before  the  farmers'  fields  were  ready  for  the  plowing,  Washing- 
ton found  himself  at  the  head  of  a  comparatively  efficient  army  of  nearly 
ten  thousand  men.  They  had  bravely  endured  the  bitter  cold,  and  depriva- 
tions of  the  season  ;  they  saw  few  idle  hours,  for  they  were  too  actively  en- 
gaged in  excursions  and  training,  to  learn  anything  of  the  idleness,  or  much  of 
the  dissoluteness  of  camp  life.  They  had  escaped  death  by  freezing  or  star- 
vation. Of  course,  they  neither  thought  nor  cared  about  uniforms.  They 
nad  arms,  such  as  they  were,  and  ammunition.  They  loved  their  general,  and 
they  were  ready  to  fight. 
22 


33*  ST  A  TE  B  UILDING* 


SECTION  THIRD. 

STATE     BUILDING— THIRTEEN    INDEPENDENT     DEMOCRATIC    COMMONWEALTHS 

FOUNDED. 

All  the  fighting  in  America,  was  done  to  win  Civil  Liberty.  The  soldier 
was  sent  to  the  field  to  secure  freedom  to  the  statesman  to  construct  code? 
and  constitutions.  Now  while  the  reign  of  winter  had  interrupted  the  move- 
ments of  both  armies,  and  the  common  sentiment  of  the  old  Thirteen  Colo- 
nies had  found  expression  through  the  Declaration  of  Independence — that 
Magna  Charta  of  Liberty  for  all  Nations,  and  for  all  Time — the 
people  of  the  separate  Colonies  appointed  their  representatives  to  meet  in 
conventions  and  legislatures,  to  frame  State  constitutions  for  their  own 
government.  This  work  had  a  vastly  broader  and  more  lasting  significance 
than  the  evolutions  of  armies  on  battle-fields.  The  proceedings  of  these 
bodies  will  interest  statesmen  to  the  end  of  time.  Lord  Bacon,  in  his  esti- 
mates of  great  men,  places  in  the  First  Class  the  Code-Framers  and  Nation- 
Builders. 

The  Foundation  Stones  on  which  the  new  Constitutions  rested. — In  trac- 
ing the  progress  of  the  construction  of  these  constitutions,  I  shall  go  into 
very  few  details.  It  will  answer  my  purpose  fully,  to  state  the  broad  principles 
which  were  recognized  as  the  bases  of  all  the  structures ;  for  differing  as  they 
did  in  form,  they  all  breathed  the  same  spirit 

First. — After  the  great  act  of  the  Fourth  of  July,  1776,  the  General  Con- 
gress recommended  all  the  States,  as  free  sovereignties,  to  form  their  own 
constitutions,  to  which  they  would  bind  all  their  citizens  in  true  allegiance. 

Second. — While  no  instructions  could  be  given  by  Congress,  still  a  Com- 
mittee had  been  appointed  to  draught  a  plan  of  Confederation  for  all  the 
Colonies ;  and,  although  the  original  Articles  of  Confederation  had  not  yet 
been  adopted,  and  were  not  till  four  years  later,  yet  the  whole  nation  was 
agreed  to  act  in  union  on  all  strictly  national  affairs,  until  a  general  Constitu- 
tion should  be  established.  Nor  was  the  idea  anywhere  entertained,  of  any 
action  by  the  separate  States  that  would  conflict  with  the  spirit  of  a  national 
union,  least  of  all  with  the  great  principles  of  republicanism,  and  local  in- 
dependent sovereignty. 

The  Characteristics  of  these  Constitutions. — Long  before  this,  in  his  re- 
markable speech  on  conciliating  the  Colonies,  Burke  paid  only  a  just  tribute 


TRAINING  OF  AMERICAN  STATESMEN.  339 

to  the  intelligence  of  the  American  people.  *  Permit  me,  sir,  to  add  another 
circumstance  in  our  colonies,  which  contributes  no  mean  part  towards  the 
growth  and  effect  of  this  intractable  spirit.  /  mean  their  education.  In  no 
country  perhaps  in  the  world,  is  the  law  so  general  a  study.  The  profession 
itself  is  numerous  and  powerful,  and  in  most  provinces  it  takes  the  lead.  The 
greater  number  of  deputies  sent  to  the  Congress  are  lawyers ;  but  all  who  read — • 
and  most  do  read — endeavor  to  obtain  some  smattering  in  that  science.  I  have 
been  told  by  an  eminent  bookseller  that  in  no  branch  of  his  business,  after 
tracts  of  popular  devotion,  were  so  many  books  as  those  on  Law  exported  to 
the  plantations.  The  colonies  have  now  fallen  into  the  way  of  printing  them 
for  their  own  use.  I  hear  that  they  have  sold  nearly  as  many  of  Black- 
stone's  Commentaries  in  America  as  in  England.' 

Training  of  American  Statesmen. — By  this  time,  moreover,  the  most  learn- 
ed and  accomplished  men  throughout  all  the  Colonies,  had  been  going  through 
a  process  of  practical  education  in  the  affairs  of  government,  more  thorough 
than  any  generation  of  men  that  had  ever  lived.  From  the  first  Colonial  Con- 
gress, which  met  at  Albany  in  the  summer  of  1765,  eleven  years  had  gone  by 
before  the  Declaration  of  Independence  was  proclaimed  ;  and  during  that  pe- 
riod more  learned  and  profound  debates  on  human  rights  had  been  witnessed 
than,  up  to  that  time,  had  occurred  in  the  history  of  the  human  race.  In 
each  separate  colony,  every  fundamental  principle  connected  with  free  civil 
government  had  been  investigated  ;  pamphlets,  essays  and  dissertations  with- 
out number  had  been  printed,  and  the  great  body  of  the  people  had  become 
familiar  with  the  cardinal  maxims  of  civil  government  as  founded  upon  the 
rights  of  man,  in  distinction  from,  and  antecedent  to,  all  rights  of  the  citizen.1 
The  American  code-makers  were  also  as  familiar  with  the  principles  of 
human  liberty  and  justice  upon  which  the  constitution  of  England  rested,  as 
were  the  best  Englishmen  themselves  ;  and  they  were  equally  learned  in  the 
constitutions  of  all  the  free  states  from  the  earliest  historical  antiquity.  But, 
except  within  certain  limitations  of  form,  they  had  no  model  to  choose  from  ; 
they  selected  what  best  suited  their  condition,  and  created  the  rest. 

Third.  The  Source  of  all  Power  lies  in  the  Bosom  of  the  People. — This 
principle  shone  out  from  every  constitution  they  formed.  "  That '  inaliena- 
ble right  of  all  men  to  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness,'  was  the  key- 
note," as  Rousseau,  that  passionate  worshipper  of  ideal  liberty,  well  said, 
"  to  the  anthem  of  universal  freedom."  In  this  spirit  they  went  confidently 
to  their  work ;  and  it  is  amazing,  in  recurring  with  studious  care  to  those 
grand  edifices  of  civil  government,  after  the  lights  and  shadows  of  a  century 
have  fallen  over  them,  to  see  how  much  wiser  they  built,  than  even  they 
themselves  knew.  Since  their  time,  no  new  principle  of  civil  government  has 
been  discovered;  no  new  contributions  have  been  made  by  the  men  who 
came  after  them,  to  the  common  treasury  of  political  wisdom.  Experience 
did    indeed,   in  many  instances,   suggest  wiser  provisions    for  carrying    out 


34o  CONSTITUTIONS  OF  THE  THIRTEEN  STATES. 

these  principles,  as  practice  alone  makes  perfect ;  and  yet  a  close  scrutiny 
reveals  the  surprising  fact,  that  even  their  modes  of  administration  and  pru- 
dential provisions,  were  so  wisely  adapted  to  their  social  condition,  very 
few  changes  have  since  been  made,  except  those  which  became  necessary  or 
advisable  with  the  developments  of  time. 

Fourth.  The  Originality  of  their  Statesmanship. — It  is  a  notable  fact 
that,  so  far  as  we  have  yet  learned,  not  a  single  statesman  who  helped  to  form 
the  American  constitutions,  had  originally  been  an  advocate  of  a  Republican 
form  of  government.  I  have  already  shown,  that  loyalty  to  the  King  of  En- 
gland was  the  original  sentiment  of  all  the  colonists,  and  that  Republicanism 
was  an  after-thought — an  outgrowth  from  circumstances — the  recourse  of 
sheer  necessity — the  fruit  of  political  oppression,  and  of  that  only.  We  shall 
now  see  that  every  American  statesman  had  cast  the  souvenirs  and  the  prin- 
ciples of  royalty  behind  his  back  :  its  precedents,  its  authority,  its  sanctions, 
and  its  traditional  sacredness,  were  all  swept  by  the  board.  Not  only  was  a 
new  leaf  to  be  turned  over  in  the  history  of  government,  but  the  whole  library 
of  codes  was  to  give  place  to  a  new  volume,  in  which  were  to  be  inscribed 
Fundamental  Statutes  springing  from  the  eternal  principles  of  human  liberty 
derived  from  the  Creator,  and  incorporated  into  the  system  of  eternal  justice 
on  which  the  moral  universe  reposes.  Whatever  of  legislation  was  now  to  be 
made,  was  to  be  framed  on,  and  adjusted  to,  this  system  alone.  Precedents 
might  be  quoted,  but  only  by  way  of  illustration.  In  jurisprudence  indeed, 
there  was  no  occasion  for  a  new  system,  for  it  had  long  ago  been  determined, 
that  the  Common  Law  of  England  was  founded  in  common  sense — it  had 
grown  out  of  the  illuminated  reason,  and  the  sense  of  natural  justice  in  the  hu- 
man soul.  It  rested  upon  that  which  was  right  in  the  nature  of  things  ;  equity 
was  its  chief  corner-stone.  Behind  the  Magna  Charta,  the  writ  of  habeas  cor- 
pus, and  trial  by  jury,  it  was  not  necessary  to  go.  All  else  was  to  be  created 
anew  ;  and  this  creation — the  grandest,  the  purest,  the  wisest,  and,  as  we  be- 
lieve, the  most  enduring — was  purely  an  American  creation.  No  improve- 
ment has  been  made  upon  it,  nor  has  any  attempt  to  imitate  it  on  a  broad 
scale  been,  as  yet,  attended  with  permanent  success.  But  it  is  the  convic- 
tion of  the  clearest  headed,  and  the  hope  of  the  warmest  hearted  among  our 
people,  that  the  American  system  is  the  one  which  mankind  will  ultimately 
find  most  favorable — not  to  say  indispensable — to  the  completest  triumphs  of 
civilization. 

The  Constitutions  of  the  Thirteen  States  in  the  order  of  adoption  : 
Massachusetts. — It  had  been  the  first  of  the  Thirteen  to  substitute  the 
name  of  the  'government  and -people'  for  the  authority  of  the  king.  On  the 
19th  of  July,  1775,  thirty-two  days  after  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill,  its 
Assembly  recognized  the  Colonial  Council  as  the  legal  depository  of  execu- 
tive power.  All  the  functions  of  government,  with  all  commissions  and 
legal  processes,  continued  under  the  provisions  of  its  old  Charter,  until  Sept- 


CONSTITUTIONS  OF  N.  H.—S.  C.—R.  I—CONN.—  VA.—N.  J.    341 

ember,  1779,  when  a  Convention  chosen  by  the  people  for  that  purpose, 
framed  a  constitution.  John  Adams,  who  was  its  main  constructor,  says  tha 
he  '  followed  three  guides  in  the  work ;  the  first  being  the  English  Constitu- 
tion ;  the  second,  the  Bill  of  Rights  of  Virginia;  the  third,  the  experience  of 
Massachusetts  herself.'  This  Constitution  was  approved  by  the  people  at  the 
ballot-box,  and  went  into  effect  the  following  year. 

New  Hampshire — During  the  first  week  in  January,  six  months  before  th 
Declaration  of  Independence,  this  Colony  formed  an  independent  govern- 
ment, with  only  few  slight  deviations  from  its  royal  charter,  except  by  vesting 
the  executive  power  in  the  State  Council,  and  this  order  of  things  continued 
till  the  close  of  the  Revolution,  when  in  June,  1783,  a  Convention  formed  a 
Constitution  which  received  the  approval  of  the  people,  and  became  the  fun- 
damental law  from  the  3 1  st  day  of  October  following. 

South  Carolina  had,  as  early  as  March  26th,  1776,  adopted  a  Provisional 
Constitution ;  a  permanent  one  being  established  two  years  later  by  an  act 
of  her  Legislature,  without  a  further  reference  to  the  people. 

Rhode  Island  was  content  to  rest  the  administration  of  power  and  justice, 
upon  her  venerable  Roger  Williams  Charter,  which  was  so  thoroughly  Repub- 
lican that,  in  May,  1776,  no  further  change  was  found  necessary,  than  blotting 
out  the  king's  name  from  the  record,  and  expunging  a  single  law  disfranchising 
Catholics,  '  which  had,  in  some  manner,'  as  one  of  her  historians  said,  '  stolen 
into  its  book  of  statutes.' 

Connecticut. — She,  too,  was  satisfied  with  her  old  charter,  which  in  days  of 
peril  she  had  committed  to  the  friendly  shelter  of  the  Charter  Oak,  and  she  had 
only  to  substitute  the  word  ■  people '  for  the  name  of  ■  king.'  This  she  did 
June  14th,  1776,  by  a  legislative  provisional  act;  but  on  the  10th  of  the  next 
October,  this  act  was  declared  to  be  perpetual. 

Virginia. — This  oldest  of  the  colonies  and  the  mother  of  a  whole  constel- 
lation of  States,  had  done  her  work  under  the  inspirations  of  her  great  states- 
men, a  month  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  Her  legislative  Con- 
vention, deeming  themselves  clothed  with  supreme  authority,  boldly  pro- 
claimed her  Constitution  based  upon  her  original  Bill  of  Rights,  and  her  own 
Declaration  of  Independence.1 

New  Jersey,  two  days  before  the  Declaration  of  Philadelphia,  had  per- 
fected and  promulgated  a  new  charter,  created  by  herself,  and  for  herself. 

1  The  British  Parliament,  in  its  Bill  of  Rights,  had  dom,  made  no  assertion  of  human  rights,  and  no  longer 
only  summed  up  the  liberties  that  Englishmen  in  the  affirmed  that  the  people  is  the  source  of  power.  Penn- 
lapse  of  centuries  had  acquired  from  their  kings  ;  the  sylvania,  Massachusetts,  and  New  Hampshire  pro- 
Americans  opened  their  career  of  independence  by  a  claimed  that  all  men  are  born  free,  and  as  a  conse- 
declaration  of  the  self-evident  rights  of  man  ;  and  this,  quence  were  the  first  to  get  rid  of  Slavery  ;  Georgia 
begun  by  Virginia,  was  repeated,  with  variations,  in  recognized  rights  derived  to  Americans  from  '  the  laws 
every  constitution  formed  after  independence,  except  of  nature  and  reason  ; '  at  the  bar  of  humanity  and  the 
that  of  South  Carolina,  In  that  State,  the  amended  bar  of  the  people.  South  Carolina  alone  remained 
constitution  breathed  not  one  word  for  universal  free-  silent. — Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  282. 


342    CONSTITUTIONS  OF  DEL.—PENN.—MD.—N  C.—GA.—N  V. 

Delaware. — After  proclaiming  her  Bill  of  Rights,  her  Convention,  chosen 
by  her  freemen  for  that  purpose,  announced  her  Constitution. 

Pennsylvania. — A  similar  Convention  adopted  a  Constitution  for  this 
Colony,  September  28th,  1776  ;  but  owing  to  its  partial  disfranchisement  of 
the  Quakers,  it  met  with  so  much  opposition,  not  only  from  them,  but  from 
many  patriotic  citizens,  that  it  did  not  go  into  operation  till  the  ensuing 
autumn. 

Maryland. — Her  Convention  met  August  14th,  1776  ;  and  after  mature 
deliberations,  perfected  and  adopted  her  Constitution  the  9th  of  November. 

North  Carolina. — She  had  elected  a  Congress — so-called— to  frame  a 
Constitution  and  ratify  it,  and  it  was  done  December  18th,  1776. 

Georgia. — The  action  of  her  Convention  was  prompt  and  unanimous,  and 
her  Constitution  was  adopted  February  5,  1777. 

New  York. — Her  Constitution  came  latest  of  all,  and  it  was  declared  in 
the  judgment  of  the  wisest  statesmen  of  the  country,  to  be  the  best  of  all. 
The  Convention  elected  for  framing  it,  was  authorized  also  to  announce  its 
adoption  by  the  act  of  the  same  body. 

The' supreme  Object  of  universal  Desire. — 'That  nothing  might  be  want- 
ing to  the  seeming  hazard  of  the  experiment,  that  nothing  might  be  wanting 
to  the  certainty  of  its  success,  full  force  was  given  to  one  principle,  which  was 
the  supreme  object  of  universal  desire.  That  which  lay  nearest  the  heart  of 
the  American  people,  that  which  they  above  all  demanded,  from  love  of  free- 
dom of  inquiry,  and  from  the  earnestness  of  their  convictions,  was,  not  the 
abolition  of  hereditary  monarchy  and  hereditary  aristocracy,  not  universal  suf- 
frage, not  the  immediate  emancipation  of  slaves  :  for  more  than  two  centuries 
the  plebeian  Protestant  sects  had  sent  up  the  cry  to  heaven  for  freedom  to  wor- 
ship God.  To  the  panting  for  this  freedom,  half  the  American  States  owed 
their  existence,  and  all  but  one  or  two  their  increase  in  free  population.  The 
immense  majority  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  Thirteen  Colonies  were  Protestant 
dissenters  ;  and  from  end  to  end  of  their  continent,  from  the  rivers  of  Maine 
and  the  hills  of  New  Hampshire,  to  the  mountain  valleys  of  Tennessee  and 

1  New  York,  the  happy  daughter  of  the  ancient  Nantes.  And  the  vengeance  was  sublime ;  for  inde- 
Netherlands,  true  to  her  lineage,  and  not  misled  by  the  pendent  New  York  with  even  justice,  secured  to  the 
recollections  of  the  Huguenots,  did,  'in  the  name  of '  Catholic  equal  liberty  of  worship,  and  equal  franchise, 
her  'good  people,  ordain,  determine,  and  declare  the  New  York  almost  alone  had  no  religious  test  for  office, 
free  exercise  of  religious  profession  and  worship,  with-  Her  liberality  was  wide  as  the  world,  and  as  the  human 
out  discrimination  or  preference,  to  all  mankind  ;'  for  race.  Henceforth  no  man  on  her  soil  was  to  suffer  dis- 
the  men  of  this  new  commonwealth  felt  themselves  '  re-  franchisement  for  creed,  or  lineage,  or  color  ;  the  con- 
quired,  by  the  benevolent  principles  of  national  liberty,  scious  memory  of  her  people  confirms,  what  honest  his- 
not  only  to  expel  civil  tyranny,  but  also  to  guard  tory  must  ever  declare,  that  at  the  moment  of  her  asser- 
against  that  spiritual  oppression  and  intolerance  where-  tion  of  liberty,  she  placed  no  constitutional  disqualifica- 
with  the  bigotry  and  ambition  of  weak  and  wicked  tion  whatever  on  the  free  blacks.  Even  the  emanci- 
princes  have  scourged  mankind.'  So  does  one  cen-  pated  slave  gained  instantly  with  his  freedom  ec  uality 
tury  avenge  the  wrongs  done  to  humanity  in  another  ;  before  the  Constitution  and  the  law.  New  York  placed 
here,  Louis  the  Fourteenth  of  France,  and  Bossuet,  restrictions  on  suffrage  and  on  eligibility  to  office  ;  but 
could  they  come  back  to  this  life,  might  read  the  Am-  those  restrictions  applied  alike  to  all. — Bancroft,  vol. 
erican  reply  to  the  sorrowful  revocation  of  the  Edict  of  ix.,  pp.  273   274. 


BRITISH  PREPARATIONS  FOR  THE  CAMPAIGN  OF  1777.    343 

the  borders  of  Georgia,  one  voice  called  to  the  other,  that  there  should  be  no 
connection  of  the  church  with'  the  state,  that  there  should  be  no  establishment 
of  any  one  form  of  religion  by  the  civil  power,  that  "  all  men  have  a  natural 
and  inalienable  right  to  worship  God  according  to  the  dictates  of  their  own 
consciences  and  understandings."  With  this  great  idea  the  Colonies  had  tra- 
vailed for  a  century  and  a  half;  and  now,  not  as  revolutionary,  not  as  destruc- 
tive, but  simply  as  giving  utterance  to  the  thought  of  the  nation,  the  States 
stood  up  in  succession,  in  the  presence  of  one  another,  and  before  God  and 
the  world,  to  bear  their  witness  in  favor  of  restoring  independence  to  con- 
science and  the  mind.  Henceforward,  worship  was  known  to  the  law  only  as 
a  purely  individual  act,  a  question  removed  from  civil  jurisdiction,  and  re- 
served for  the  conscience  of  every  man.' ' 


SECTION  FOURTH. 


PREPARATIONS    OF   THE    BRITISH    FOR   THE    CAMPAIGN    OF    1 777. 

The  news  of  the  terrible  defeat  of  the  patriot  army  on  Long  Island, 
filled  the  ministry  with  exultation.  It  would  have  been  made  still  more  com- 
plete by  the  succession  of  disasters  which  so  soon  followed,  had  not  the  won- 
derful retreat  of  Washington  with  his  army  deprived  those  victories  of  some 
part  of  their  lustre.  But  when  intelligence  was  received  of  the  almost  in- 
credible victories  of  Trenton  and  Princeton,  and  the  utter  failure  of  the  mili- 
tary plans  of  Lord  Howe,  a  different  feeling  began  to  come  over  the  British 
people,  and  the  ministry  saw  that  more  vigorous  preparations  must  be  made 
for  the  prosecution  of  the  approaching  campaign.  Passionate  and  misguided 
counsels  had  launched  the  empire  into  a  formidable  war.  Generals  who  had 
distinguished  themselves  on  other  fields,  against  the  best  captains  in  Europe, 
had  been  over-matched  by  the  American  commander,  and  the  '  ununiformed 
mob  of  rebels  '  had  inspired  a  new  sentiment  of  respect  for  their  valor  and 
endurance. 

Demands  were  made  for  large  bodies  of  recruits  for  the  army  and  navy,  and 
preparations  of  unexpected  magnitude  were  called  for.  The  most  efficient 
measures  were  adopted  ;  and  yet  it  was  found  impossible  so  suddenly  to  answer 
the  demand  for  men  among  the  subjects  of  the  king.  Promises  the  most  flat- 
tering proved  unavailing  to  induce  captured  American  sailors  to  enter  the 
service  of  a  hated  tyrant,  and  threats  the  most  unmanly  and  degrading  were 
resorted  to  in  vain.9 

The  ship  '  Reprisal '  which  carried  Franklin  to  France,  took  several 
prizes  into  Nantes,  with  a  hundred  of  their  crews  prisoners.    Franklin  proposed 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  272,  273.  'Hang  me  if  you  will  to  the  yardarm  of  your  ship, 

8  The   reply  of  Nathan   Coffin    was  characteristic     but  do  not  ask  me  to  become  a  traitor  to  my  coun 
of  the  brave  class   to  which  he  belonged.     He  said,     try.' 


344  GERMANY  SCOURED  FOR  MORE  TROOPS. 

an  exchange  for  the  same  number  of  Americans.  His  communication  to 
Lord  Stormont — the  English  Ambassador  at  Paris,— received  no  attention, 
This  neglect  was  followed  by  a  remonstrance  so  earnest,  that  it  at  last  called 
forth  the  following  contemptuous  reply  :  «  The  king's  ambassador  receives 
no  applications  from  rebels,  unless  they  come  to  implore  his  majesty's 
mercy.'  This  was  thoroughly  British  •  but  how  politic  it  was,  became  evident 
enough  from  subsequent  events.  Insults,  and  cruelties  the  most  brutal,  were 
all  through  the  war  resorted  to  with  our  seamen,  until  the  very  word  impressment 
made  the  eyes  of  American  sailors  flash  fire.  For  the  next  half  a  century, 
it  discolors  the  diplomatic  correspondence  of  the  two  countries  ;  it  tinges  their 
histories  ;  it  darkens  the  pages  of  romance,  and  casts  a  far-reaching  shadow 
over  the  British  name.  A  blind  persistence  in  that  policy  brought  on  the 
Second  War  with  England,  and  hurried  us  to  the  verge  of  others,  until  the 
good  sense  and  illuminated  statesmanship  of  Ashburton  and  Webster,  finally 
removed  this  fruitful  cause  of  trouble  in  the  Treaty  of  Washington. 

More  Mercenary  Troops,— Unable  to  recruit  her  army  at  home,  England 
once  more  turned  to  the  continent,  casting  all  other  reliances  aside  except 
the  power  of  gold  to  purchase  men  in  the  open  markets  of  Germany.  The 
1  subsidized  kinglings '  who  were  engaged  in  '  the  trade  in  soldiers '  needed 
money,  and  they  could  sell  subjects.  The  tiny  Prince  of  Waldeck,  impressed 
eighty-nine  of  his  unwilling  subjects,  and  kept  them  locked  up  in  the  fortress 
of  Hameln  ready  for  use.  The  Prince  of  Cassel  raised  ninety-one  recruits, 
and  four  hundred  and  sixty-eight  yagers  ;  and  '  by  forced  impressment,  theft, 
and  other  doubtful  means,'  Hesse-Cassel,  in  the  year  '77  raised  1,450.  But 
this  hardly  made  good  Washington's  work  at  Trenton,  while  the  work  of  pes- 
tilence at  Brunswick  had  in  two  months  carried  off  more  than  three  hundred 
'as  able  men  as  ever  stood  in  the  ranks  of  the  army.'  All  Hessians,  too,  being 
objects  of  special  animosity,  were  marked  out  for  vengeance,  wherever  sharp- 
shooters got  sight  of  them.  * 

The  Margrave  of  Brandenburg-Anspach,  kinsman  of  George  III.,  and 
nephew  to  Frederick  of  Prussia,  furnished  two  regiments  of  1,200  men,  <  tall, 
neatly-clad,  handling  their  bright  and  faultless  arms  with  dexterity,  spirit,  and 
exactness.'  No  means  were  too  infamous  for  the  little  tyrants  who  became 
the  willing  kidnappers  of  British  Ministers.1    Money  was  lavishly  spent,  while 

1  The  subsidized  princes  sought  for  men  outside  court  of  Vienna,  in  the  name  of  Maria  Theresa,  and 
of  their  own  lands,  and  forced  into  the  service  not  Joseph  the  Second,  reclaimed  their  subjects  and  desert- 
merely  vagabonds  and  loose  fellows  of  all  kinds,  but  ers. 

any  unprotected  traveller  or  hind  on  whom  they  could  Still  more  formidable  was   the  rankling   discontent 

lay  their  hands.     The  British  agents  became  sensitive  of  the  enlisted  men.     The  regiments  of  Anspach  could 

to  the  stories  which  were  told  of  them,  and  to  '  the  ex-  not  be  trusted  to  carry  ammunitions  or  arms,  but  were 

cessive   defamation  '  which    they   encountered.      The  driven  on  by  a  company  of  trusty  yagers  well  provided 

rulers  of  the  larger  states  felt  the  dignity  of  the  empire  with  both,  and  ready  to  nip  a  mutiny  in  the  bud.    Yet 

insulted.       Frederick  of    Prussia   never   disguised  his  eighteen  or  twenty  succeeded  in  deserting.     When  the 

disgust.       The   court    of   Vienna   concerted    with    the  rest  reached  their  place  of  embarkation  at  Ochsenfurt- 

Klector  of  Mentz,  and  the  Elector  of  Treves  to  throw  on-the-Main.  the  regiment  of  Bayreuth  besjan  to  march 

a  slur  on  the  system.      At  Mentz,  the  yagers  of  Ha-  away  and  hide  themselves  in  some  vineyards.       The 

nau  who  came  first  down  the  Rhine  were  stopped,  and  yagers,  who  were  all  picked  marksmen,  were  ordered  to 

eight  of  them   rescued   by    the  elector's  order,    as  his  fire  among  them,   by  which  some  of  them  were  killed, 

subjects  or  soldiers.     From  the  troops  of  the  landgrave  They  avenged    themselves    by  putting    the  yagers  to 

of  Hesse,  eighteen  were  removed  by  the  commissioners  death.     The  Margrave  of  Anspach,  summoned  by  ex- 

of   the  eccles  astical  prince   of  Treves.     At   Coblentz,  press,  rode  to  the  scene   in  the  greatest  haste,  leaving 

Metternich,    the    active    young  representative    of  the  his  watch  oa  his  table,  and  without  a  shirt  to  change. 


TR  YONS  FOR  A  Y  INTO  CONNECTICUT.  345 

their  virtue,  if  they  had  any,  was  tested,  and  their  vices,  in  which  the> 
abounded,  were  ministered  to.  But  all  this  scouring  of  Germany  ended  in 
raising  only  3,600  men,  while  from  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  during  the  en- 
tire year  of  1777,  only  3,252  recruits  were  raised  to  send  to  New  York,  and 
726  to  Canada. 

How  this  scanty  Supply  was  eked  out — Enlistments  of  the  Disloyal  in 
America. — For  this  odious  and  unscrupulous  work,  Governor  Tryon  was  ap- 
pointed the  general  officer.  He  was  a  daring,  relentless,  unscrupulous  man. 
As  early  as  1768,  while  in  the  service  of  the  king  in  North  Carolina,  he  had 
displayed  these  qualities  so  well,  that  he  had  been  transferred  to  New  York, 
where  his  sanguinary  conduct  earned  for  him  a  name  of  lasting  infamy.1 
His  name  had  been  made  familiar  through  the  Carolinas,  and  along  the  banks 
of  the  Mohawk,  as  a  man  who  never  wavered  in  his  loyalty  to  the  king,  who 
hesitated  not  to  call  into  requisition  whatever  means  would  promote  his  ob- 
ject— holding  out  standing  offers  for  the  scalp  of  any  patriot,  or  a  bribe  to  any 
republican  to  desert  the  national  cause.  He  became  the  leader  of  the  Tories 
and  Royalists  of  the  North  in  the  Revolution. 

The  murderous  Foray  of  Tryon  into  Co?mecticut . — On  the  25  th  April,  before 
the  campaign  of  1777  had  fully  opened,  Governor  Tryon,  at  the  head  of  eigh- 
teen hundred  British  and  Tories,  landed  on  the  shore  of  Long  Island  Sound, 
between  Fairfield  and  Norwalk,  with  an  expedition  intended  solely  for  pillage, 
burning,  and  murder.  He  destroyed  a  quantity  of  stores  belonging  to  the 
patriots  at  Danbury,  overpowered  the  guard  of  fifty  under  Colonel  Huntington, 
and  burned  the  town,  murdering  some  of  the  unresisting  inhabitants,  and 
throwing  their  bodies  into  the  flames  of  their  dwellings.  Sullivan,  Arnold, 
and  Wooster  hastily  assembled  the  '  minute  men '  from  the  whole  neighbor- 
hood, and  pursued  the  marauder  to  Ridgefield.  Fierce  and  bloody  skirmish- 
ing ensued,  in  which  the  Americans  displayed  the  utmost  valor.  The  ven- 
erable General  Wooster  had,  so  far  back  as  1745,  participated  in  the  siege  of 
Lewisburg,  serving  with  reputation  as  a  captain  in  the  British  army ;  after- 
wards in  the  Prench  and  Indian  war  ;  and  now,  although  seventy  years  old, 
in  his  full  vigor,  and  promising  to  be  of  great  future  service,  died  that  day, 
after  conduct  which  would  have  covered  a  young  captain  with  glory,  leaving 
a  record  which  endeared  him  not  only  to  his  native  State,  but  to  the  whole 
country.  Arnold,  who  fought  with  all  his  characteristic  bravery,  narrowly 
escaped ;  but  he  displayed  such  superb  courage  and  skill,  that  Congress  ap- 
plauded his  devotion,  and  presented  him  with  a  fine  horse  fully  caparisoned 
for  the  field.     Tryon  had  no  reason  to  congratulate  himself  on  the  result, 

He  who  by  the  superstitions  of  childhood  and  hallowed  land's  father  never  left  his  post   till,    at    the  end   of 

traditions  was  their  land's  father  stood  before  them.  March,  in  the  presence  of  Sir  Joseph  Yorke,  his  child- 

l'he  sight  overawed  them.     They  acknowledged  their  ren,  whose  service  he  had  sold,  were  delivered  by  him 

fault,  and  submitted  to  his   severe  reprimands.     Four  in    person   on   board   the  British   transports  at    Seva- 

of  them  he  threw   into  irons,   and  ordered  all   to  the  vandell. — Bancroft,  vol.  ix„  pp.  316,  317. 
boats.     Instead  of  the  yagers,  he  in   person  assumed  '    I  have  no  space  for  the  record  ;  Judge  William 

the   office  of  driver  ;  marched   them   through    Metz  in  W.  Campbell,  in  his  Border  Warfare  of  New  York — one 

defiance  of  the  elector  ;  administered  the  oath  of  fideli-  of  the  most  valuable  contributions  to  local  history  that 

ty  to    the   King  of  England    at  Nymwegen  ;  and  the  has  ever  been  made — has  portrayed  Tryon's  character. 


346  EXPEDITIONS  TO  SAG  HARBOR  AND  NEWPORT. 

for  he  was  closely  followed  up  by  Sullivan,  who  harassed  him  all  the  way  to 
the  coast ;  and  when  he  reached  Campo  where  his  vessels  lay,  he  was  heavily 
raked  by  the  artillery  of  the  gallant  Lamb.  He  lost  nearly  three  hundred 
men  during  the  expedition,  while  in  killed  and  wounded  it  cost  the  Ameri- 
cans not  half  that  number. 

Brilliant  Night  Expedition  to  Sag  Harbor. — The  vigilance  of  the  Ameri- 
cans lost  no  opportunity  for  daring  and  aggressive  adventures.  At  Sag 
Harbor,  on  the  eastern  point  of  Long  Island,  large  magazines  of  grain  and 
forage  had  been  made  by  the  British.  Colonel  Meigs,  who  had  been  one  of 
Arnold's  bravest  companions  in  the  march  to  Canada,  leaving  Guilford,  Con- 
necticut, with  a  hundred  and  seventy  men  in  whale-boats,  May  22d,  1777,  at 
two  o'clock  in  the  morning  surprised  and  seized  the  post,  burned  twelve  ves- 
sels with  the  store-houses  and  their  contents,  captured  ninety  prisoners,  and 
reached  Guilford  after  traversing  nearly  one  hundred  miles  by  land  and  water 
in  twenty-five  hours  without  losing  a  man.1 

Another  Dash. — On  the  night  of  the  10th  of  July  the  same  season,  an 
equally  brilliant  feat  was  performed  by  Colonel  William  Barton.  With  a  few 
picked  men,  he  crossed  Narraganset  Bay  in  whale-boats  through  the  British 
fleet  unobserved,  and  stealthily  reaching  the  headquarters  of  the  British 
General  Prescott — the  house  still  standing  above  Newport,  a  mile  from  the 
bay — seized  him  in  bed,  and  took  him  across  the  bay  to  Warwick,  where, 
soon  after  daybreak,  he  was  sent  in  a  carriage  under  a  strong  guard  to  Provi- 
dence, and  from  thence  transferred  to  Washington's  headquarters,  where,  un- 
fortunately, his  exchange  brought  back  no  better  man  than  General  Charles 
Lee,  whose  redemption  was  very  dear  at  that  purchase.2 

Try 'ori  s  chief  Allies  in  the  Work  of  enlisting  the  Tories. — The  two  most  effi- 
cient were  De  Lancey  of  New  York,  and  Cortland  Skinner  of  New  Jersey. 
Their  activity  and  adroitness  were  equalled  only  by  the  means  at  their  dis- 
posal for  seduction  and  bribery;  but  with  all  these  appliances  during  the 
whole  season  they  enlisted  only  five  or  six  hundred  men  each.  To  the  honor 
of  the  American  name  it  should  be  stated,  that  these  were  mostly  foreigners ; 
and  to  the  honor  of  foreign  nations  it  may,  with  equal  justice,  be  said,  they 
were  renegades — bad  men  who  had  doubtlessly  left  their  country  for  their 
country's  good. 

An  Embassy  to  France. — In  September,  1776,  Congress  appointed  three 
commissioners  to  negotiate  a  Treaty  of  Alliance  with  Louis  XVT.  In  the 
preceding  spring,  Silas  Deane 3  had  been  sent  to  Paris  by  the  Secret  Com- 

1  For  this  gallant  service  Congress  voted  thanks  to  Barton  a  splendid  sword,  and  the  rank  and  pay  of  a 

Meigs  and   his  men,  and    a  beautiful    sword    to  their  colonel  in  the  army. 

commander.     Sergeant  Cummings  was  also  promoted  3  Silas  Deane. — In  consequence  of  the  extravagant 

by  Washington.  contracts  he  had   entered  into,    not  authorized  by  his 

8  Congress,  never  slow  to  recognize  any  brilliant  or  instructions,    he   was  recalled,   November  21st,    1777, 

patriotic  service  in  the  national  cause,  voted  Colonel  and  John  Adams  appointed   in   his  place.      He  left 


AN  EMBASSY  TO  FRANCE.  347 

mittee  of  Congress,  as  an  agent  to  negotiate  loans,  obtain  munitions  of  war, 
and  such  other  aid  as  France,  Spain,  Holland,  and  the  Prince  of  Orange,  or 
their  subjects,  might  be  disposed  to  render  to  the  insurgent  Colonies.  All 
these  governments  hated  and  feared  England  as  the  over-shadowing  military, 
commercial,  and  Protestant  power  of  Europe  ;  and  they  would  willingly  have 
seen  any  blow  levelled  against  that  power,  whose  arrogance  had  wounded 
their  pride,  whose  armies  circumscribed  their  dominion,  and  whose  invincible 
navy  threatened  to  sweep  their  commerce  from  all  the  seas.  It  was  chiefly 
on  this  account,  that  the  sympathies  of  these  powers  were  readily  extended 
to  the  insurgents  of  the  West,  and  they  were  disposed  to  encourage  the 
Revolution,  so  far  as  they  could  without  involving  themselves  in  a  war  with 
their  common  foe,  before  they  were  prepared  for  the  struggle.  But  open 
recognition  of  the  American  agent  was  considered  premature,  although  his 
mission  was  attended  with  some  success.  Fifteen  thousand  muskets,  which 
had  been  laid  aside  as  almost  useless,1  were  secretly  furnished  from  the 
Frenph  arsenals ;  some  money  was  advanced,  and  abundant  encouragement 
extended  for  further  assistance.  But  Deane,  although  a  graduate  of  Yale 
College,  and  a  member  of  the  Congress  of  1774,  was  distinguished  by  no 
considerable  ability  beyond  some  commercial  experience,  and  a  certain 
doubtful  adroitness  in  negotiation.  He  was  not  a  man  to  move  cabinets,  or 
win  personal  popularity.  But  it  was  considered  well  to  retain  him  in  the 
service,  since  two  of  the  foremost  statesmen  of  the  country  had  been 
designated  for  the  embassy.  Jefferson  had  already  retired  from  Congress  to 
aid  his  native  State  in  shaping  her  institutions  to  the  new  condition  of  affairs, 
and  declined  leaving,  and  Arthur  Lee's  name  was  substituted,  partly  because 
he  was  a  Virginian  and  a  brother  of  Richard  Henry  Lee,  and  partly  because 
he  was  a  gentleman  of  refinement,  and  a  writer  of  some  force  and  polish, 
although  he  seems  to  have  been  entirely  lacking  in  magnanimity  of  character. 
In  fact,  it  would  have  been  altogether  a  discreditable  commission,  had  not 
Franklin  been  at  the  head  of  it ;  '  and  as  long  as  that  is  so,'  said  our  friends 
at  home  and  abroad,  '  no  matter  who  is  in  the  middle,  or  at  the  tail.'  *  Thus,' 
remarks  Bancroft,  ■  the  United  States  were  to  be  represented  in  France  to 
its  people,  and  to  the  older  house  of  Bourbons,  by  a  treacherous  merchant, 
by  a  barrister,  who,  otherwise  a  patriot,  was  consumed  by  malignant  envy, 
and  by  Franklin,  the  greatest  diplomatist  of  his  country.'  The  embassy 
meant  Franklin,  who  represented  in  his  manner,  dress,  and  essential  dignity 
of  character,  the  venerable  impersonation  of  the  republics  of  antiquity.  He 
wore  a  plain  Quaker  dress ;  his  plain  American  tanned  calf-skin  shoes  were 
tied  with  leathern  strings.  His  prestige  as  a  great  discoverer  in  science, 
and  the  homage  paid  to  him   by  learned   men  whose  society  he  most  fre- 

Paris  April  i,  1778,  and  on  his  return,  being  required  zens  of  the  United  States  on  the  same  subject,  and, 
to  give  an  account  of  his  proceedings,  on  the  floor  of  returning  to  Europe,  died  in  great  poverty. — Apple- 
Congress,  evaded  a  complete  disclosure  on  the  ground  ton's  Cyclopedia,  1874. 

that  his  papers   were   in    Europe.     He  then  attacked  1  Of  the  French  arms  obtained  from  the  arsenals, 

Congress  and    his    fellow-commissioners  in  a  public  Lafayette,    in   his   '  Memoirs,'   says  :      '  Silas   Deane 

manifesto,  but  did  not  succeed   in  removing  suspicion  despatched  privately  to  America  some  old  arms  which 

of  himself  of  having  misapplied  the  public  money.     He  were  of  little  use,  and  some  young  officers  who  did  bu< 

afterwards  publish  ed,  in  1784,  an  address  to  the  citi-  little  good.'— Vol.  i.,  p.  7. 


348  FIRST  INTERVIEW  WITH  VERGENNES. 

quented,  soon  made  him  an  object  of  such  adulation  in  Paris,  that  the  young 
beaux  imitated  his  dress,  and  studied  the  sobriety  and  dignity  of  his  manner. 
It  early  became  evident  that  he  would  sway  the  thoughts,  and  perhaps  the 
policy  of  the  most  splendid  court  in  Europe.  Had  there  not  been  such 
complete  symmetry,  refinement,  and  unaffected  majesty  of  demeanor  in  all 
he  said,  appeared  to  be,  and  actually  was,  the  French  of  Louis  Sixteenth's  time 
would  have  paid  him  no  such  homage. 

The  literary  and  diplomatic  circles  had  watched  the  American  struggle 
thus  far  with  intense  interest.  The  essential  portions  of  the  new  Constitutions 
had  been  translated  and  widely  read.  Their  air  of  manly  independence  ;  the 
supremacy  of  state  over  the  dictates  of  the  church ;  the  establishment  of 
liberty  of  worship,  and  liberty  of  conscience ;  above  all,  the  spectacle  of  a 
young  nation,  in  the  far-off  wilds  of  a  new  world,  establishing  a  republic  in 
defiance  of  the  mightiest  Power  in  Europe,  filled  the  young  men  of  France 
with  rapture.  Already  the  new  Republic  had  begun  to  shape  the  destinies  of 
the  Old  World. 

The  first  Interview  of  the  Commissioners  with  the  Chief  Minister  of  State. 
— It  was  on  the  morning  of  the  28th  of  December  that  Vergennes  read  their 
commission,  and  the  Plan  which  Congress  had  proposed  for  the  Treaty  of 
Alliance  with  France.  The  minister  alluded  in  the  most  cordial  terms  to  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  French  people  for  the  American  cause,  and  assured  the 
commissioners  of  the  good-will  of  the  king  and  his  cabinet — of  protection, 
of  kindness,  of  confidence,  and  respect.  But  he  impressed  upon  them  the 
absolute  necessity  of  extreme  caution  and  reticence  on  both  sides.  It  was  not 
necessary  for  the  minister  to  say  that  Louis  and  his  people  had  inherited 
souvenirs  of  lost  possessions  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  ;  nor  how  deeply 
French  pride  had  been  wounded  by  the  arrogance,  assumption,  and  grow- 
ing supremacy  of  Great  Britain.  Nor  need  he  disclaim  any  unfriendly  re- 
collections that  might  have  grown  out  of  the  Seven  Years'  War  which  drove  the 
Lilies  from  the  then  fairest  portions  of  America;  for,  as  I  have  already  had 
occasion  to  remark,  they  looked  upon  that  war  as  one  between  the  King  of 
England  and  the  King  of  France,  and  not  between  France  and  the  American 
Colonies.  But  the  hour  had  not  yet  come  for  the  final  conflict  between 
those  two  Powers,  which  all  the  statesmen  of  Europe  now  saw  to  be  in- 
evitable. The  government  of  Louis  would  do  all  it  could  without  provok- 
ing an  open  rupture  with  England.  Prizes  taken  under  the  American  flag 
would  be  allowed  to  enter  French  ports.  The  manner  in  which  France 
could  show  her  friendship  by  some  substantial  acts,  was  to  be  left  open  for 
consideration.  The  minister  requested  Franklin — with  whom  alone  the 
business  was  transacted — to  prepare  for  his  use  a  paper  on  the  con- 
dition of  the  Colonies,  from  which  he  might  gain  as  complete  a  compre- 
hension of  the  whole  case  as  possible.  He  desired  that  the  utmost  secrecy 
should  be  observed,  that  their  interviews  should  be  without  the  intervention 
of  any  third  party,  only  nothing  should  be  withheld  from  the  Spanish  Am- 


WHAT  AMERICA  ASKED  OF  LOUIS.  349 

bassador,  since  his  government  and  France  were  in  perfect  accord,  and,  for 
the  present,  no  step  would  be  taken  without  the  concurrence  of  both. 

Although  no  such  great  results  sprang  from  our  friendly  relations  with 
Spain  as  compared  with  France,  yet  the  spirit  of  modern  progress  had  recently 
developed  itself  in  the  Peninsula,  and  the  progressive  statesmen  and  advanced 
minds  of  Europe  looked  forward  to  a  resurrection  of  Spain  from  what  had, 
for  the  better  part  of  a  century,  appeared  to  indicate  a  hopeless  decadence. 
In  Count  de  Aranda,  Charles  the  Third  had  a  fearless  servant,  not  only  as 
an  ambassador  at  the  Court  of  Louis,  but  a  trusted  counsellor  in  the  Cabinet 
at  Madrid.  His  advice  had  prevailed  in  the  expulsion  of  the  Jesuits  from 
Spain ;  and  his  energy  had  suppressed  the  riots  which  followed  at  Madrid. 
But  repeated  interviews  with  Aranda  secured  little  more  than  the  pledge  that 
the  American  privateers,  with  their  prizes,  should  have  the  same  security  in 
Spanish  ports,  as  had  been  guaranteed  to  them  by  France. 

What  the  Commissioners  requested  from  the  King. — Vergennes  had  already 
been  furnished  with  Franklin's  paper,  and,  in  the  interview  on  the  5th  of 
January,  a  request  was  presented  in  writing,  that  the  Americans  should  be 
furnished  with  eight  line-of-battle  ships,  twenty  or  thirty  thousand  muskets, 
and  brass  cannon,  with  munitions  for  the  whole.  The  request  was  sustained 
by  arguments,  addressed  both  to  Versailles  and  Madrid  :  '  The  interests  of  the 
three  nations  are  the  same ;  the  opportunity  for  securing  a  commerce,  which 
in  time  will  be  immense,  now  presents  itself;  if  neglected,  it  may  never  re- 
turn ;  delay  maybe  attended  with  fatal  consequences.'  This  petition  received 
the  most  careful  consideration  j  and  on  the  13th  of  the  month,  Gerard  met 
the  commissioners  for  a  night  interview,  at  a  private  house  in  Paris,  and  read 
to  them  the  king's  answer.  ■  Neither  ships  nor  convoys  could  be  fur- 
nished without  compromising  the  French  government.  Time  and  events 
must  be  waited  for,  and  provision  made  to  profit  by  them.  The  United 
Provinces ' — as  our  colonies  were  called — '  may  be  assured  that  neither  France 
nor  Spain  will  make  them  any  overture  that  can  in  the  least  contravene  their 
essential  interests ;  that  they  both,  wholly  free  from  every  wish  for  conquests, 
always  have  singly  in  view  to  make  it  impossible  for  the  common  enemy  to 
injure  the  United  Powers.  The  commercial  facilities  afforded  in  the  ports  of 
France  and  Spain,  and  the  tacit  diversion  of  the  two  Powers — whose  expensive 
armaments  obliged  England  to  divide  her  efforts — manifest  the  interest  of  the 
two  crowns  in  the  success  of  the  Americans.  The  king  will  not  incommode 
them  in  deriving  resources  from  the  commerce  of  his  kingdom,  confident  that 
they  will  conform  to  the  rules  prescribed  by  the  precise  and  rigorous  meaning 
of  existing  treaties,  of  which  the  two  monarchs  are  exact  observers.  Unable 
to  enter  into  the  details  of  their  supplies,  he  will  mark  to  them  his  benevo- 
lence and  good-will,  by  destining  for  them  secret  succors  which  will  assure  and 
extend  their  credit  and  their  purchases.' 

Good  Faith  of  the  King. — One  hundred  thousand  dollars  were  paid  quar- 


350  EM  BARK  A  TION  OF  LAFA  YE  TTE. 

terly  to  the  banker  of  the  embassy,  the  first  instalment  being  instantly  provided 
for.  As  soon  as  it  could  be  prudently  done,  three  vessels  laden  with  military 
stores  were  made  ready  for  sea  by  Deane  and  Beaumarchais,  between  whom, 
under  the  guise  of  a  commercial  partnership,  the  business  was  transacted.  One 
of  them  was  taken  by  the  British  cruisers,  but  the  other  two  arrived  with  their 
treasures  before  the  summer  campaign  of  1777  was  opened.  The  commis- 
sioners had  also  been  allowed  to  enter  into  a  contract  to  furnish  the  agents 
of  the  French  government  with  fifty-six  thousand  hogsheads  of  tobacco,  on 
which  they  received  an  advance  of  one  million  francs. 

Unavailing  Complaints  of  the  British  Minister. — It  is  needless  to  state 
that  Lord  Stormont  knew  everything  that  was  going  on.  But  as  long  as  he 
could  not  reveal  the  sources  of  his  information,  and  there  had  been  no  open 
infraction  of  the  law  of  nations,  he  was  obliged  to  content  himself  with  such 
vexatious  but  impotent  complaints,  and  perplexing  demands  for  disclaimers 
and  denials,  as  diplomacy  could  devise,  to  embarrass  an  enemy  with  whom  his 
government  was  not  prepared  to  go  to  war.  The  cabinet  of  London  was,  how- 
ever, thrown  into  a  frenzy  of  anger  and  chagrin  at  the  kindness  known  to  have 
been  extended  to  the  American  embassy,  and  the  enthusiasm  manifested 
throughout  France  for  the  American  cause ;  and  well-founded  alarm  at  its 
growing  strength  all  over  the  continent  of  Europe.1 

Embarkation  of  Lafayette. — Simultaneously  with  these  friendly  acts  on  the 
part  of  the  government  of  the  king,  Lafayette  was  maturing  his  preparations 
with  the  secrecy  he  was  compelled  to  observe,  for  his  expedition  to  America — 
a  movement  to  which  history  has  attached  an  importance  which  has  seldom 
attended  the  act  of  a  private  individual,  and  which  was  to  color  our  fortunes 
with  tintings  more  brilliant  perhaps,  than  have  ever  been  drawn  by  the  sober 
pen  of  history,  or  the  wizard  hand  of  romance.  In  his  '  Personal  Memoirs,' 
with  whose  charming  details  the  world  is  so  familiar,  we  learn  how  long  and 
how  persistently  Lafayette  worked  to  carry  out  his  design,  and  how  fruitless 
were  the  endeavors  of  his  friends  and  relations,  who  were  among  the  noblest 
and  most  powerful  in  France,  to  repress  his  unconquerable  enthusiasm  for 
the  cause  of  American  liberty,  or  to  defeat  the  ingenious  devices  he  was  com- 
pelled to  resort  to  in  order  to  accomplish  his  purpose. 

1  It  is  somewhat  amusing,  in  reading  the  diplomatic  niently  repair  for  a   supply.      Vergennes  rather  ac- 

correspondence  and  conversations  between  the  English  knowledged  the  rightfulness  of  the  demand,  represent- 

and  French  ministers  at  the  time,  to  think  how  closely  ing  the  Americans  and   their  friends  as  escaping  his 

England,  more  than  eighty  years  afterwards  copied  from  vigilance.     England  was  uneasy  at  the  presence  of  the 

France  the  subterfuges  and  evasions  with  which  she  at-  American    commissioners  in   Paris  ;    Vergennes  com- 

tempted  to  shirk  the  responsibility  of  fitting  out  the  pared  the  house  of  a  minister  to  a  church  which  any  one 

Alabama  and  other  piratical  craft,  which  she  equipped  might  enter,  but  with   no  certainty  that  his  prayers 

or  allowed  to  sail  from  her  ports,  to  prey  upon  the  com-  would  be  heard.    England  claimed  the  right  of  search, 

merce  and  lives  of  the  citizens  of  the  United  States.  Vergennes  admitted  it  in  the  utmost  latitude  in  the 

Until  a  declaration  of  war  between  France  and  Eng-  neighborhood  of  any  part  of  the  British  dominions  ;  but 

land,  the  former  never  recognized  the  Americans  as  a  demurred  to  its  exercise  in  mid-ocean.     England   did 

oelligerent  power,  but  merely  threw  upon  England  the  not  scruple  to  seize  and  confiscate  American  property 

burden  of  maintaining  her  own  municipal  laws.     When  wherever  found;  France   held   that  on  the  high   seas 

England  required  France  to  close  the  harbors  against  American  property  laden   in  French  ships  was  invio- 

American  priva  teers,  the  French  minister  professed  to  lably  safe.    England  delayed  its  declaration  of  war  from 

admit  them  only  in  distress,  requiring  them  to  leave  motives  of  convenience  ;    France  knew  that  it  was  im- 

forthwith.      Bancroft  well  says  :     '  England   insisted  minent  and  inevitable,  and  prepared  for  it  with  the  ut- 

that  no  arms  cr  munitions  of  war  should  be  exported  to  most  vigilance.' 
America,  or  t/>  ports  to  which  Americans  could  conve- 


SPR AGUE'S  WELCOME  TO  LAFAYETTE.  351 

Descended  from  one  of  the  noblest  families  of  France ;  the  sole  living 
male  representative  of  the  proudest  lineage  ;  a  member  of  the  most  brilliant 
court  in  Europe  ;  rich  beyond  the  dream  of  dependence  ;  married  at  the  age  of 
sixteen  to  one  of  the  noblest  and  most  accomplished  daughters  of  another 
ancient  house  ;  carrying  his  heart  with  his  alliance  to  the  altar  j  but  fired  like  a 
young  paladin  by  the  spirit  of  heroism,  and  panting  with  an  ambition  to  distin- 
guish himself  in  the  struggle  of  a  new  nation  for  its  freedom,  he  turned  his 
back  upon  the  blandishments  of  the  great,  the  brilliant  future  which  awaited 
him,  and  above  all,  the  bewitching  endearments  of  his  home,  and  pressing  to 
his  heart  the  fond  bosom  which  held  the  hope  of  his  name  and  his  house — to 
pass  over  the  sea  and  place  himself  by  the  side  of  the  deliverer  of  a  nation  !  I 
know  not  if  its  parallel  can  be  found  in  human  history.  Nor,  although  it  may 
be  an  apparent  departure  from  even  the  slender  thread  of  historic  narrative 
which  I  wish  to  maintain,  still  I  cannot  resist  the  temptation  to  cast  one 
glance  into  the  future,  when  half  a  century  had  gone  by,  and  the  young  repub- 
lic that  first  entranced  him,  had  grown  into  power  and  glory,  rose  to  greet 
him  with  its  undying  love.  On  the  Fourth  of  July,  1825,  the  venerable 
Lafayette,  on  his  last  visit  to  America,  was  one  of  the  fascinated  listeners  to 
the  following  magical  words  of  Sprague,  the  poet-orator  of  the  occasion,  and 
of  the  country.  The  historic  situation  of  the  dark  days  we  are  now  dwelling 
on,  is  portrayed  with  such  matchless  power  and  beauty,  that  it  is  far  more 
worthy  of  a  place  in  this  text,  than  anything  I  could  utter,  or  borrow  from 
other  men. 

Sprague1  s  Greeting  to  Lafayette  in  1825. — 'While  we  bring  our  offerings 
for  the  mighty  of  our  own  land,  shall  we  not  remember  the  chivalrous  spirits 
of  other  shores,  who  shared  with  them  the  hour  of  weakness  and  woe  ?  Pile 
to  the  clouds  the  majestic  columns  of  glory ;  let  the  lips  of  those  who  can 
speak  well,  hallow  each  spot  where  the  bones  of  your  Bold  repose  ;  but  for- 
get not  those  who  with  your  Bold  went  out  to  battle. 

'Among  the  men  of  noble  daring,  there  was  One,  a  young  and  gallant 
stranger,  who  left  the  blushing  vine-hills  of  his  delightful  France.  The  peo- 
ple whom  he  came  to  succor  were  not  his  people ;  he  knew  them  only  in  the 
wicked  story  of  their  wrongs.  He  was  no  mercenary  adventurer,  striving  for 
the  spoil  of  the  vanquished  ;  the  palace  acknowledged  him  for  its  lord,  and  the 
valley  yielded  him  its  increase.  He  was  no  nameless  man,  staking  life  for 
reputation ;  he  ranked  among  nobles,  and  looked  unawed  upon  kings.  He 
was  no  friendless  outcast,  seeking  for  a  grave  to  hide  a  broken  heart ;  he  was 
girdled  by  the  companions  of  his  childhood ;  his  kinsmen  were  about  him ; 
his  wife  was  before  him  ! 

'  Yet  from  all  these  he  turned  away.  Like  a  lofty  tree,  that  shakes  down 
its  green  glories  to  battle  with  the  winter  storm,  he  flung  aside  the  trappings 
of  place  and  pride,  to  crusade  for  freedom,  in  freedom's  holy  land.  He  came 
— but  not  in  the  day  of  successful  rebellion ;  not  when  the  new  risen  sun  of 
independence  had  burst  the  cloud  of  time,  and  careered  to  its  place  in  the 


352  LAFAYE  TTETS  CA  REER  DELINEA  TED. 

heavens.  He  came  when  darkness  curtained  the  hills,  and  the  tempest  was 
abroad  in  its  anger ;  when  the  plough  stood  still  in  the  field  of  promise,  and 
briers  cumbered  the  garden  of  beauty.  He  came  when  fathers  were  dying, 
and  mothers  were  weeping  over  them  ;  when  the  wife  was  binding  up  the 
gashed  bosom  of  her  husband,  and  the  maiden  was  wiping  the  death  damp 
from  the  brow  of  her  lover.  He  came  when  the  brave  began  to  fear  the 
power  of  man,  and  the  pious  to  doubt  the  favor  of  God. 

1  It  was  then  that  this  One  joined  the  ranks  of  a  revolted  people.  Free- 
dom's little  phalanx  bade  him  a  grateful  welcome.  With  them  he  courted 
the  battle's  rage ;  with  theirs  his  arm  was  lifted,  with  theirs  his  blood  was 
shed.  Long  and  doubtful  was  the  conflict.  At  length,  kind  Heaven  smiled 
on  the  good  cause,  and  the  beaten  invaders  fled.  The  profane  were  driven 
from  the  temple  of  Liberty;  and  at  her  pure  shrine  the  pilgrim  warrior,  with 
his  adored  Commander,  knelt  and  worshipped.  Leaving  there  his  offering, 
and  the  incense  of  an  uncorrupted  spirit,  he  at  length  rose  up,  and,  crowned 
with  benedictions,  turned  his  happy  feet  towards  his  long-deserted  home. 

'After  nearly  fifty  years,  that  One  has  come  again.  Can  mortal  tongue 
tell,  can  mortal  heart  feel,  the  sublimity  of  that  cqming  ?  Exulting  millions 
rejoice  in  it,  and  their  loud,  long,  transporting  shout,  like  the  mingling  of 
many  winds,  rolls  on,  undying,  to  freedom's  farthest  mountains.  A  congre- 
gated nation  comes  round  him.  Old  men  bless  him,  and  children  reverence 
him.  The  lovely  come  out  to  look  upon  him,  the  learned  deck  their  halls  to 
greet  him,  the  rulers  of  the  land  rise  up  to  do  him  homage.  How  his  full 
heart  labors  !  He  views  the  rusting  trophies  of  departed  days,  he  treads  the 
high  places  where  his  brethren  moulder,  he  bends  before  the  tomb  of  his 
Father; — his  words  are  tears — the  speech  of  sad  remembrance.  But  he 
looks  round  upon  a  ransomed  land  and  a  joyous  race  ;  he  beholds  the  bless- 
ings these  trophies  secured,  for  which  those  brethren  died,  for  which  that 
Father  lived ;— and  again  his  words  are  tears — the  eloquence  of  gratitude 
and  joy. 

1  Spread  forth  creation  like  a  map ;  bid  earth's  dead  multitudes  revive  ;  — 
and  of  all  the  pageant  splendors  that  ever  glittered  to  the  sun,  when  looked 
his  burning  eye  on  a  sight  like  this  ?  Of  all  the  myriads  that  have  come  and 
gone,  what  cherished  minion  ever  ruled  an  hour  like  this?  Many  have 
struck  the  redeeming  blow  for  their  own  freedom ;  but  who,  like  this  man, 
has  bared  his  bosom  in  the  cause  of  strangers  ?  Others  have  lived  in  the 
love  of  their  own  people ;  but  who,  like  this  man,  has  drank  his  sweetest  cup 
of  welcome  with  another?  Matchless  chief!  of  glory's  immortal  tablets,  there 
is  one  for  him,  for  him  alone  !  Oblivion  shall  never  shroud  its  splendor  ;  the 
everlasting  flame  of  liberty  shall  guard  it,  that  the  generations  of  men  may 
repeat  the  name  recorded  there,  the  beloved  name  of  Lafayette.!' 

How  Lafayette  became  connected  with  the  American  Cause. — The  account 
given  by  Sparks  in  the  writings  of  George  Washington, — volume  v.,  appendix 
No.  i,  page  445, — was   doubtless  furnished   to  the  American   historian  by 


WHY  HE  ESPOUSED  OUR  CAUSE.  353 

Lafayette  himself,  since  it  is  well  known  that  Sparks  visited  Lafayette  in  1828, 
and  was  for  a  considerable  time  his  guest.  His  statement  moreover,  corre- 
sponds perfectly  with  Lafayette's  Memoirs  of  himself.  Says  Sparks  : — l  In 
the  summer  of  1776,  M.  de  Lafayette  was  stationed  on  military  duty  at  Metz, 
being  then  an  officer  in  the  French  army.  It  happened  at  this  time,  that  the 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  brother  to  the  King  of  England,  was  at  Metz,  and  a 
dinner  was  given  to  him  by  the  commandant  of  that  place.  Several  officers 
were  invited,  and  among  others  Lafayette.  Despatches  had  just  been  received 
by  the  duke  from  England,  and  he  had  made  their  contents  the  topic  of  con- 
versation; they  related  to  American  affairs,  the  recent  declaration  of  inde- 
pendence, the  resistance  of  the  colonists,  and  the  strong  measures  adopted 
by  the  ministry  to  crush  the  rebellion. 

'The  details  were  new  to  Lafayette  ;  he  listened  with  eagerness  to  the  con- 
versation, and  prolonged  it  by  asking  questions  of  the  duke.  His  curiosity 
was  deeply  excited  by  what  he  heard,  and  the  idea  of  a  people  fighting  for 
liberty  had  a  strong  influence  upon  his  imagination ;  the  cause  seemed  to  him 
just  and  noble,  from  the  representations  of  the  duke  himself;  and  before  he 
left  the  table,  the  thought  came  into  his  head  that  he  would  go  to  America,  and 
offer  his  services  to  a  people  who  were  struggling  for  freedom  and  independ- 
ence. From  that  hour  he  could  think  of  nothing  but  this  chivalrous  enter- 
prise.    He  resolved  to  return  to  Paris  and  make  further  inquiries. 

"  When  he  arrived  in  that  city,  he  confided  his  scheme  to  two  young  friends, 
Count  Segur  and  Viscount  de  Noailles,  and  proposed  that  they  should  join 
him.  They  entered  with  enthusiasm  into  his  views ;  but  as  they  were  de- 
pendent on  their  families,  it  was  necessary  to  consult  their  parents,  who 
reprobated  the  plan  and  refused  their  consent.  The  young  men  faithfully 
kept  Lafayette's  secret :  his  situation  was  more  fortunate,  as  his  property  was 
at  his  own  disposal,  and  he  possessed  an  annual  revenue  of  nearly  two  hun- 
dred thousand  livres. 

"  He  next  explained  his  intentions  to  the  Count  de  Broglie,  who  told  him 
that  his  project  was  so  chimerical,  and  fraught  with  so  many  hazards,  with- 
out a  prospect  of  the  least  advantage,  that  he  could  not  for  a  moment  regard 
it  with  favor,  nor  encourage  him  with  any  advice  which  should  prevent  him 
from  abandoning  it  immediately.  When  Lafayette  found  him  thus  deter- 
mined, he  requested  that  at  least  he  would  not  betray  him,  for  he  was 
resolved  to  go  to  America.  The  Count  de  Broglie  assured  him  that  his  con- 
fidence was  not  misplaced.  '  But,'  said  he,  '  I  have  seen  your  uncle  die  in 
the  wars  of  Italy ;  I  witnessed  your  father's  death  at  the  battle  of  Minden  ; 
and  I  will  not  be  accessory  to  the  ruin  of  the  only  remaining  branch  of  the 
family.'  He  then  used  all  his  powers  of  argument  and  persuasion  to  divert 
Lafayette  from  his  purpose,  but  in  vain.  Finding  his  determination  unaltera- 
ble, the  Count  de  Broglie  said,  as  he  could  render  him  no  aid,  he  would  intro- 
duce him  to  the  Baron  de  Kalb,  who  he  knew  was  seeking  an  opportunity 
to  go  to  America,  and  whose  experience  and  counsels  might  be  valuable." 

Speaking  of  himself  in  the   third  person,  Lafayette  says  in  his  Memoirs: 

2\ 


354  BURGOYNE'S  PROJECTED  INVASION. 

'After  having  encountered  for  seven  weeks  various  perils  and  chances,  he 
arrived  at  Georgetown  in  the  Carolinas.  Ascending  the  river  in  a  canoe,  his 
feet  touched  at  length  the  American  soil,  and  he  swore  that  he  would  con- 
quer or  perish  in  the  cause.  Having  procured  horses,  he  set  out  with  six 
officers  to  Philadelphia  to  repair  to  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  rid- 
ing nearly  nine  hundred  miles  on  horseback.1  He  was  presented  for  the 
first  time  to  Washington  at  a  dinner  at  which  several  members  of  Congress 
were  present.  When  they  were  separating,  Washington  drew  Lafayette 
aside,  expressed  much  kindness  for  him,  complimented  him  upon  his  zeal 
and  sacrifices,  and  invited  him  to  consider  the  headquarters  as  his  own  house, 
adding  with  a  smile,  that  he  could  not  promise  him  the  luxuries  of  a  court, 
but  that  as  he  was  become  an  American  soldier,  he  would  doubtless  submit 
cheerfully  to  the  customs  and  privations  of  a  republican  army.  The  next 
day  Washington  visited  the  forts  of  the  Delaware,  and  invited  Lafayette  to 
accompany  him.1 

Burgaynis  projected  Invasion  from  Canada. — It  was  planned  in  the  closet 
of  George  III.  by  Lord  Germain,  General  Burgoyne,  and  the  King.  All 
doubt  on  this  subject  has,  for  some  time,  been  dispelled  ;  especially  was  the 
plan  of  the  employment  of  the  savages,  the  work  of  the  sovereign.  In  Ger- 
main's letter  to  Sir  Guy  Carleton,  July  25,  1777,  he  says  :  'After  considering 
every  information  that  could  be  furnished,  the  king  gave  particular  directions 
for  every  part  of  the  disposition  of  the  forces  in  Canada.'  Bancroft  further 
states  :  u  It  was  their  hope  to  employ  bands  of  wild  warriors  along  all  the  fron^ 
tier.  Carleton  had  checked  their  excesses  by  placing  them  under  agents  of 
his  own  appointment,  and  by  confining  them  within  the  limits  of  his  own  com- 
mand.  His  scruples  gave  offence,  and  all  his  merciful  precautions  were  swept 
away.  The  king's  peremptory  orders  were  sent  to  the  northwest  to  extend 
operations,  and,  among  those  whose  inclination  for  hostilities  was  no  more  to 
be  restrained,  were  enumerated  the  Ottawas,  the  Chippewas,  the  Wyandotts, 
the  Shawnees,  the  Senecas,  the  Delawares  and  the  Potawotomies.9  Joseph 
Brant,  the  Mohawk,  returned  from  his  interview  with  the  secretary,  to  rouse 
the  fury  of  his  countrymen,  and  to  make  them  clamor  for  war  under  leaders  of 
their  own,  who  would  indulge  them  in  their  excesses  and  take  them  wherever 
they  wished  to  go.  Humane  British  and  German  officers  in  Canada  were 
alarmed  at  the  crowds  of  red-men  who  were  ready  to  take  up  the  hatchet, 
but  only  in  their  own  way,  foresaw  and  deplored  the  effects  of  their  unre- 
strained and  useless  cruelty,  and  from  such  allies,  augured  no  good  to  the  ser- 
vice. But  the  policy  of  Germain  was  unexpectedly  promoted  by  the  release 
of  La  Corne  Saint  Luc,  who  came  in  advance  to  meet  his  wishes.  This  most 
ruthless  of  partisans  was  now  in  his  sixty-sixth  year,  but  full  of  vigor  and  ani- 
mal spirits,  and  only  more  passionate  and  relentless  from  age.  He  had  vowed 
eternal  vengeance  on  the  beggars  who  had  kept  him  captive.  He  stood 
ready  to  pledge  his  life  and  his  honor,  that,  within  sixty  days  of  his  landing  at 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p,  321.        2  Lord  George  Germain,  to  Sir  Guy  Carleton,  March  26,  1777,  MS. 


INVESTMENT  OF  TICONDEROGA.  355 

Quebec,  he  would  lead  the  Indians  to  the  neighborhood  of  Albany.  His 
words  were :  '  We  must  let  loose  the  savages  upon  the  frontiers  of  these  scoun- 
drels, to  inspire  terror,  and  to  make  them  submit  j '  and  his  promises  faithfully 
reported  to  Germain,  won  favor  to  the  leader  who,  above  all  others,  was  no- 
torious for  brutal  inhumanity."  ' 

The  King's  Plan  for  the  Campaign. — From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of 
the  Revolution,  he  interested  himself  in  the  minutest  details  concerning  the 
American  war.  He  cherished  with  great  confidence  the  idea  of  the  concerted 
action  of  the  forces  under  Burgoyne  at  the  North,  and  Howe  at  the  South, 
which,  by  a  descent  from  Canada,  and  an  advance  from  New  York,  would 
cut  off  all  intercourse  between  New  England  and  the  other  States,  and  per- 
manently control  the  Hudson.  In  the  month  of  May,  Burgoyne  reached 
Quebec,  and  was,  says  Lafayette,  '  already  advancing  with  ten  thousand  men, 
preceded  by  his  proclamations  and  his  savages.'  Colonel  St.  Leger  was 
despatched  with  a  strong  force  to  Oswego  to  effect  a  junction  with  Johnson  and 
Brant,  and  after  capturing  Fort  Stanwix,  to  join  Burgoyne' s  main  army  at 
Albany. 

Investment  of  Ticonderoga. — With  upwards  of  ten  thousand  men,  Bur- 
goyne invested  Ticonderoga  on  the  7th  of  July.  General  St.  Clair's  garri- 
son did  not  exceed  three  thousand  men,  but  leaving  his  outworks  he  pre- 
pared for  an  assault.  On  the  evening  of  the  5th,  discovering  that  the 
British  had  planted  a  battery  of  heavy  guns  on  Mt.  Defiance, — a  hill  which 
rises  more  than  five  hundred  feet  on  the  southwest  side  of  the  outlet 
of  Lake  George,  opposite  Ticonderoga — and  knowing  that  any  resistance 
would  be  in  vain,  he  removed  his  stores  up  the  lake  to  Skenesborough — now 
Whitehall — and  under  cover  of  the  night  crossed  over  with  his  forces  to  Mt. 
Independence,  from  which  he  commenced  a  retreat  to  Fort  Edward,  the 
headquarters  of  Major-General  Schuyler,  then  in  command  of  the  Northern 
army.  The  flight  would  have  been  successful  but  for  the  fatal  burning  of  a 
building  on  Mt.  Independence,  which  revealed  it.  The  brigade  of  General 
Fraser,  and  Reidsel's  two  Hessian  corps  started  instantly  in  the  pursuit. 
They  came  up  with  the  chief  division  under  Colonel  Seth  Warner  at 
Hubbardton,  just  after  sunrise,  July  7th,  when  the  Americans,  after  a  fierce 
engagement,  fled  with  a  loss  in  killed,  wounded,  and  missing  of  more  than 
three  hundred ;  the  British  reporting  their  loss  at  one  hundred  and  eighty- 
three.  Before  evening  of  the  same  day,  a  British  flotilla,  by  a  rapid  move- 
ment, had  overtaken  and  destroyed  the  stores  which  St.  Clair  had  sent  up  the 
lake,  as  well  as  others  collected  at  Whitehall.  Finally,  on  the  evening  of 
the  1 2th,  St.  Clair  reached  Schuyler's  headquarters  with  the  fragments  of  his 
shattered  army,  which  had  fought  bravely  against  hopeless  odds,  but  with  a 
heavy  loss  of  men  and  military  stores,  and,  what  could  so  ill  be  spared, 
nearly  two  hundred  pieces  of  artillery. 

1  Governor  Tryon  to  Secretary  Germain,  9  April,  1777,  MS. 


350  VICTORY  OF  BENNINGTON. 

Schuyler  retreats  down  the  Hudson,  and  establishes  a  fortifi;d  Camp 
at  the  Mouth  of  the  Mohaivk. — With  no  more  facilities,  an  abler  strategist 
might  have  more  effectually  arrested  the  advance,  even  of  so  superior  a 
force,  although  led  by  so  able  a  general  as  Burgoyne.  But  Schuyler  had  none 
of  the  qualities  of  a  great  commander;  although  he  displayed  some  alacrity  and 
decision  in  obstructing  the  march  of  Burgoyne  after  St.  Clair's  retreat.  His 
utmost  effective  force  did  not  reach  four  thousand,  but  he  despatched  a  strong 
party  towards  Whitehall,  who  broke  up  all  the  bridges,  and  felled  heavy 
trees  over  the  roads  which  Burgoyne' s  army  must  pass,  thus  greatly  impeding 
his  advance. 

Schuyler's  Call  for  Reinforcements. — From  his  new  headquarters,  a  cry 
for  reinforcements — sanctioned  by  Washington's  earnest  appeal — was  sent  in 
all  directions,  and  it  was  nobly  responded  to.  Detachments  from  the  regular 
army  were  sent  on  by  forced  marches  under  Washington's  orders ;  General 
Lincoln  reached  the  camp,  and  volunteers  came  in  from  all  quarters,  while 
a  large  body  of  militia  from  the  New  England  States  flew  to  his  side. 

Splendid  Victory  of  Bennington. — The  well-known  integrity  and  patri- 
otism of  Schuyler  had  gained  him  great  popularity  and  respect  through- 
out the  State  of  New  York,  and  with  the  hearty  co-operation  of  the  Com- 
mander-in-chief,— who  watched  over  the  Northern  department  with  peculiar 
care,  and  sent  to  Schuyler  more  regiments  than  it  seemed  prudent  to  spare — ■ 
an  army  of  thirteen  thousand  men  was  soon  gathered.  Fairly  roused  to  the 
situation,  Schuyler  seemed  to  have  atoned  for  the  lack  of  more  vigorous  mea- 
sures in  the  spring.  So  serious  were  the  obstructions  he  interposed  to  Bur- 
goyne' s  advance  that  the  British  army  was  exhausted  by  fatigue,  and  running 
so  short  of  provisions  by  the  30th  of  July,  some  desperate  measures  had 
to  be  taken  to  replenish  his  supplies ;  for,  with  his  loss  by  skirmishes,  casu- 
alties, and  sickness,  he  had  still  an  army  of  ten  thousand  men.  With  the 
hope  of  seizing  the  stores  which  the  patriots  had  collected  at  Bennington,  a 
strong  detachment  of  Canadians,  Tories,  Indians,  and  Hessians  under  Colo- 
nel Baum,  was  despatched  on  this  mission — a  distance  of  nearly  forty  miles. 
They  were  sure  of  meeting  with  trouble,  for  Stark,  'who  could  do  anything 
with  the  New  Hampshire  militia,'  had  hurried  them  to  Bennington,  and  against 
the  indomitable  courage  of  this  man,  whom  nature  had  made  so  rude  and 
yet  so  great,  the  enemy  were  to  dash  in  vain.1  Without  counting  numbers, 
Stark  advanced  with  his  corps  to  fight  this  motley  crOwd,  which  the  agents 

1  In  Washington  and  his  Generals,  Hon.  J.  T.  his  early  life.  The  roar  of  the  blast  without  would  re- 
Headley — with  a  graphic  power  of  delineation  so  rare  mind  him  of  his  wild  bivouacs  when  a  bold  young 
and  so  entrancing — gives  a  touching  description  of  the  ranger,  amid  the  snow  in  the  wilderness,  and  the 
old  age  of  Gknkral  Stark,  and  finely  sums  up  his  strange  events  of  his  stormy  career  come  back  like  an 
character  : — *  After  the  disbanding  of  the  army,  he  re-  ancient  dream  on  his  staggering  memory.  Eighty- 
turned  to  his  home,  and  at  the  age  of  fifty-five  be-  four  years  of  age  when  the  Last  War  commenced  he 
came  a  sober  farmer  and  quiet  citizen.  Here  he  lived  listened  to  the  far-off  roar  of  battle  like  an  old  war- 
in  retirement,  and  like  a  good  ship,  which  has  long  horse  whose  spirit  is  unbroken,  but  whose  energies  are 
braved  the  storm,  and  at  last  is  left  to  crumble  slowly  gone.  When  he  was  told  that  the  cannon  he  had  taken 
away  in  a  peaceful  port,  gently  yielded  to  the  pressure  at  Bennington  were  among  the  trophies  surrendered 
of  years  and  the  decay  of  age.  With  his  white  locks  by  Hull  in  the  capitulation  at  Detroit,  he  evinced  the 
falling  around  his  strongly-marked  visage,  he  would  greatest  emotion.  He  mourned  for  "  his  guns,"  as  h« 
while  away  many  a  long  winter  evening  in  relating  to  was  wont  to  call  them,  as  if  they  had  been  his  children. 
bis  children  and  to  his  grandchildren  the  adventures  of  They  had  become  a  part  of  his  existence,  associated  't 


HEROISM  OF  STARK  AND  WARNER.  35 \ 

of  the  British  government  had  scoured  two  continents  to  raise.  Men  who  had 
been  spoiled  by  civilization  on  the  one  side,  and  savages  who  had  no  concep- 
tion of  civilization  on  the  other,  were  no  match  for  those  hardy  settlers  who 
owned  the  soil  they  cultivated,  unwilling  though  it  was  to  have  even  a  scanty 
subsistence  wrung  from  it  by  honest  labor.  Four  days  after  St.  Clair's  re- 
treat, Stark  had  marched  out  into  the  village  of  Hoosick,  five  miles  from 
Bennington,  where,  by  one  of  those  irresistible  assaults,  which  neither  Hes- 
sians, nor  Tories,  nor  Indians,  ever  withstood,  the  marauders  were  swept 
from  the  field — scattered  and  pursued  in  all  directions.  Towards  sunset, 
however,  Colonel  Breyman  with  another  strong  German  party,  suddenly  ap- 
peared to  renew  the  attempt  to  capture  the  stores.  But  every  step  they 
took  was  disputed  by  Colonel  Seth  Warner's  Green  Mountain  boys,  who, 
•  with  their  stalwart  courage,  deadly  aim,  and  breathless  activity,  repelled  the 
attack  so  successfully,  and  followed  it  up  with  such  desperation,  that  of  the 
two  large  bodies  who  had  joined  in  the  day's  conflict,  not  a  man  but  fell  dead, 
or  wounded,  or  a  prisoner,  except  those  who  escaped  by  flight.  The  whole 
nation  rang  with  the  victory.  The  disproportion  of  loss  on  the  two  sides 
was  almost  unprecedented  ;  it  had  cost  the  Americans  less  than  two  hundred 
in  wounded  and  dead,  and  there  were  no  prisoners  that  day,  except  of  the 
invaders.  The  moment  Congress  received  the  news,  a  vote  of  thanks  was 
passed  to  the  Green  Mountain  boys  and  the  New  Hampshire  militia,  and 
Stark  was  made  a  brigadier-general  in  the  regular  army. 

Burgoyne's  Loss. — The  expedition  had  cost  him  a  thousand  men,  but  this 
alone  might  not  have  proved  fatal ;  it  shattered  his  whole  plan  for  the  cam- 
paign ;  it  was  the  beginning  of  the  end  of  his  military  career  in  America,  as 
the  decisive  struggle,  now  imminent  and  inevitable,  was  so  soon  to  prove. 

A  bloody  Raid  along  the  Mohawk. — While  these  scenes  were  being  en- 

his  old  age  with  one  of  the  most  brilliant  events  of  his  never  hear  of  the  militia  fleeing  from  him  in  battle.  Al 
life,  and  it  was  like  robbing  him  to  take  away  the  Bunker's  Hill,  at  Bennington,  at  Trenton,  and  Prince- 
monuments  of  his  fame.  He  longed  once  more  for  the  ton,  they  followed  him  without  hesitation  into  any 
energy  of  youth  to  take  the  field  again,  but  the  danger,  and  were  steady  as  veterans  beneath  the  most 
thread  of  life  was  drawing  to  its  last  span,  and  his  galling  fire.  This  moral  power  over  troops  is  the  bat- 
battles  were  all  over.  Still  he  lived  ten  years  longer,  tie  half  gained  before  it  is  fought,  and  shows  a  charac- 
and  at  the  age  of  ninety-four  rested  from  his  labors.  ter  possessed  of  great  strength  or  some  brilliant,  strik- 
ing quality.  His  eccentricities  and  bluntncss  no  doubt 
his  character.  pleased  his  men,  but  it  was  his  determined  courage, 
1  General  Stark  was  a  man  of  strong  character,  confidence  in  his  own  resources,  and  amazing  power 
frank  even  to  bluntness,  and  both  stern  and  kind.  .  In-  of  will,  that  gave  him  such  unbounded  influence  over 
dependent,  yet  fearless,  he  yielded  neither  to  friend  them.  But  his  greatest  eulogy  is,  he  was  an  incor- 
nor  foe.  In  youth,  an  adventurous  woodsman — in  ruptible  patriot.  No  neglect  or  wrong  could  swerve  his 
manhood,  a  bold  ranger,  and  in  maturer  years  an  able  just  and  noble  soul  from  the  path  of  duty,  and  though 
and  skilful  commander,  he  passed  through  his  long  honor  forbade  him  for  a  while  from  serving  in  the  army, 
career  without  a  spot  on  his  name.  Few  lives  are  he  fitted  out  his  sons,  one  after  another,  and  sent  them 
marked  by  greater  adventure,  yet  amid  all  his  perils—  into  the  field!  How  different  from  the  conduct  of 
through  two  long  wars,  and  in  many  battles,  though  Arnold! 

exposing  himself  like  the  meanest  soldier  in  the  fight —  '  He  was  borne  to  the  grave  with  military  honors, 
he  never  receivea  a  wound.  and  now  sleeps  on  the  shores  of  the  Merrimac.  where 
•  '  He  was  a  good  commander,  and  showed  himself  in  the  river  takes  a  long  and  steady  sweep,  revealing  hif 
every  position  equal  to  its  demands.  He  loved  action,  tomb  for  miles  up  and  down  the  quiet  valley.  He  was 
and  was  at  home  on  the  battle-field.  Charles  XII.  buried  here  at  his  own  request,  and  it  seems  a  fit  rest- 
was  his  favorite  hero,  and  he  always  carried  his  life  ing-place  for  the  bold  and  independent  patriot.  As  his 
with  him  in  his  campaigns.  The  stern  and  resolute  glance  was  free  and  open  in  life,  so  his  grave  is  where 
character  of  this  chivalric  king  harmonized  with  his  the  winds  of  his  native  land  have  full  play,  and  the 
own.  and  he  made  the  history  of  his  deeds  his  constant  vision  full  scope.  A  plain  granite  obelisk  stands  ibov* 
companion.  He  possessed,  to  a  great  degree,  one  of  his  remains,  on  which  is  inscribed  simply,  Major  Gen 
the  most  important  qualities  of  an  efficient  and  sue-  eral  Stark..' 
cessfui  officer — wonderful  power  over  his  troops.     We 


358 


A  BLOODY  RAID  ON  THE  MOHAWK. 


acted  around  the  battle-grounds  of  the  old  French  war  among  the  sources 
of  the  Hudson,  St.  Leger  with  his  murderous  savages  had  been  joined  by 
Brant  with  his  Mohawk  Indians,  and  a  large  body  of  Tories  under  Johnson.1 
Their  first  point  of  attack  after  leaving  Oswego,  was  Fort  Stanwix.  The 
garrison,  under  the  command  of  Colonel  Gansevoort,  made  a  brave  and  per- 
sistent defence.  General  Herkimer,  with  the  militia  he  had  hastily  mustered, 
pressed  forward  to  the  relief  of  the  fort.  Falling  into  an  ambush2  a  bloody 
conflict  followed,  and  the  brave  general  was  mortally  wounded.3  During  the 
same  hour,  Colonel  Willett  with  a  corps  of  the  garrison,  made  a  daring  sortie. 


1  From  a  letter  of  Lord  Germain  to  Sir  Guy  Carleton, 
March  26,  1777,  and  a  father  letter  of  Lieutenant- 
Governor  Hamilton,  Detroit,  of  July  27,  of  the  same 
year — both  quoted  by  Bancroft  from  the  oirginal  manu- 
script— we  find  that  '  Hamilton,  the  Lieutenant-Gover- 
nor of  Detroit,  in  obedience  to  orders  from  the  Secre- 
tary of  State,  sent  out  fifteen  several  parties,  consist- 
ing in  the  aggregate  of  two  hundred  and  eighty-nine 
red  braves  with  thirty  white  officers  and   rangers,  to 

growl  on  the  frontiers  of  Pennsylvania  and  Virginia.'— 
iancroft,  vol.  ix.,  p.  377.  It  was  in  this  fiendish  spirit 
that  George  III.  determined  in  the  confidential  coun- 
cils of  his  secret  closet  to  carry  on  the  war.  No  dis- 
tinction was  made  between  rebels  in  arms,  and  mothers 
and  children  and  old  men. 

a  'A  messenger  from  Brant's  sister  brought  word 
that  Herkimer  and  the  militia  of  Tryon  County  were 
marching  to  its  relief.  A  plan  was  made  to  lay  an 
ambush  of  savages  for  this  party,  which  encamped  on 
the  fifth  at  a  distance  of  twelve  miles.  During  the 
evening  the  savages  filled  the  woods  with  yells.  The 
next  morning,  having  carefully  laid  aside  their  blankets 
and  robes  of  fur,  the  whole  corps  of  Indians  went  out 
naked,  or  clad  only  in  hunting-shirts,  armed  with 
spear,  tomahawk,  and  musket,  and  supported  by  Sir 
John  Johnson,  and  some  part  of  his  loyal  Yorkers,  by 
Colonel  Butler  and  his  rangers,  by  Claus  and  his  Cana- 
dians, and  by  Lieutenant  Bird  and  a  party  of  regulars. 
'  The  patriot  freeholders  of  the  Mohawk  Valley,  most 
of  them  sons  of  Germans  from  the  Palatinate,  seven  or 
eight  hundred  in  number,  misinformed  as  to  the  strength 
of  the  besieging  party,  marched  through  the  wood  with 
security  and  carelessness.  About  an  hour  before  noon, 
when  they  were  within  six  miles  of  the  fort,  their  van 
entered  the  ambuscade.  They  were  surprised  in  front 
by  Johnson  and  his  Yorkers,  while  the  Indians  attacked 
their  flanks  with  fury,  and  after  using  their  muskets 
rushed  in  with  their  tomahawks.  The  patriots  fell 
back  without  confusion  to  better  ground,  and  renewed 
the  fight  against  superior  numbers.  There  was  no 
chance  for  tactics  in  this  battle  of  the  wilderness. 
Small  parties  fought  from  behind  trees  or  fallen  logs  ; 
or  the  white  man  born  on  the  banks  of  the  Mohawk, 
wrestled  single-handed  with  the  Seneca  warrior,  like 
himself  the  child  of  the  soil,  mutually  striking  mortal 
wounds  with  the  bayonet  or  the  hatchet,  and  falling  in 
the  forest,  their  left  hands  clenched  in  each  other's  hair, 
their  right  grasping  in  a  gripe  of  death  the  knife 
plunged  in  each  other's  bosom.  [Gouverneur  Morris  in 
N.  Y.  Hist.  Coll.,  ii.,  133.] 

'Herkimer  was  badly  wounded  below  the  knee, 
but  he  remained  on  the  ground  giving  orders  to  the 
end.  [In  his  Field- Book  0/  the  Revolution,  vol.  i., 
p.  246,  Lossing  says  :  "A  musket-ball  passed  through 
and  killed  the  horse  of  the  general,  and  shattered  his 
own  leg  just  below  the  knee.  With  perfect  composure 
and  cool  courage,  he  ordered  the  saddle  to  be  taken 
from  his  slaughtered  horse  and  placed  against  a  large 
beech-tree  near.  Seated,  there,  with  his  men  falling 
like  autumn  foliage,  and  the  bullets  of  the  enemy,  like 
driving  sleet,  whistling  around  him,  the  intrepid  general 
calmly  gave  his  orders,  and  thus  nobly  rebuked  the 
slanderers  who  called  him  coward.  It  is  stated  that 
during  the  hottest  of  the  action,  the  general,  seated 
upon  his  saddle,  quietly  took  his  tinder-box  from  his 
pocket,  lighted  his  pipe,  and  smoked  as  composedly  as 
if  seated  at  his  own  fireside.] ' 

4  Thomas  Spencer  died  the  death  of  a  hero.    The 


battle  raged  for  at  least  an  hour  and  a  half,  when  the 
Americans  repulsed  their  assailants,  but  with  the  loss 
of  about  one  hundred  and  sixty  killed,  wounded,  and 
taken,  the  best  and  bravest  people  of  Western  New 
York.  The  savages  fought  with  wild  valor  ;  three  and 
thirty  or  more  of  their  warriors,  among  them  the  chief 
warriors  of  the  Senecas,  lay  dead  beneath  the  trees  ; 
about  as  many  more  were  badly  wounded.  The  Brit- 
ish loss,  including  savages  and  white  men,  was  proba  • 
bly  about  one  hundred.  Three  men  having  crossed  the 
morass  into  Fort  Stanwix  to  announce  the  approach  of 
Herkimer,  by  Gansevoort's  order  two  hundred  and 
fifty  men,  half  of  New  York,  half  of  Massachusetts, 
under  Lieutenant-Colonel  Marinus  Willett,  made  a 
sally  in  the  direction  of  Oriska.  They  passed  through 
the  quarters  of  the  Yorkers,  the  rangers,  and  the  sava- 
ges, driving  before  them  whites  and  Indians,  chiefly 
squaws  and  children,  capturing  Sir  John  Johnson's 
papers,  five  British  flags,  the  gala  fur-robes  and  the 
new  blankets  and  kettles  of  the  Indians,  and  four  pris- 
oners. Learning  from  them  the  check  to  Herkimer, 
the  party  of  Willett  returned  quickly  to  Fort  Stanwix, 
bearing  their  spoils  on  their  shoulders.  The  five  cap- 
tured colors  were  displayed  under  the  Continental  flag. 
It  was  the  first  time  that  a  captured  banner  had  floated 
under  the  stars  and  stripes  of  the  Republic.  The  In- 
dians were  frantic  with  grief  at  the  death  of  their  chiefs 
and  warriors  ;  they  suffered  in  the  chill  nights  from 
loss  of  their  clothes  ;  and  not  even  the  permission  in 
which  they  were  indulged  of  torturing  and  killing  their 
captives — conformable  to  the  Indian  custom — could 
prevent  their  returning  home. 

'Meanwhile,  Willett,  with  Lieutenant  Stockwel'. — 
both  good  woodsmen — made  their  way  past  the  Indian 
quarter  at  the  hazard  of  death  by  torture,  in  quest  of  a 
force  to  confront  the  savages  ;  and  Arnold  was  charged 
with  the  command  of  such  an  expedition.  Long  be- 
fore its  approach,  an  Indian  ran  into  the  camp,  report- 
ing that  a  thousand  men  were  coming  against  thein  ; 
another  followed,  doubling  the  number ;  a  third 
brought  in  a  rumor  that  three  thousand  men  were 
close  at  hand  ;  and  deaf  to  Saint  Leger  and  to  their 
Superintendents,  the  wild  warriors  robbed  the  British 
officers  of  their  clothes,  plundered  the  boats,  and 
moved  off  with  the  booty.  Saint  Leger,  in  a  panic, 
though  Arnold  was  not  within  forty  miles,  hurried  after 
them  before  night-fall,  leaving  his  tents  standing,  and 
abandoning  most  of  his  artillery  and  stores.' — Ban- 
croft, vol.  ix.,  pp.  379-381. 

3  Washington  entertained  the  highest  admiration 
and  respect  for  Herkimer  : — '  He  it  was,'  were  his 
words,  'who  first  reversed  the  gloomy  scene  of  the 
Northern  campaign.  The  hero  of  the  Mohawk  Valley 
served  from  love  of  country,  not  for  reward.  He  did 
not  want  a  Continental  command,  or  money.'  Dying  of 
his  wound  before  Congress  could  reward  him,  they  de- 
creed him  a  monument. 

Lossing  pays  Herkimer  the  following  tribute : — 
"  The  Continental  Congress,  grateful  for  his  services, 
resolved  to  erect  a  monument  to  his  memory,  of  the 
value  of  $500.  But  till  1847,  no  stone  identified  his 
grave.  Then  a  plain  marble  slab  was  set  up  with  the 
name  of  the  hero  upon  it ;  and  when  I  visited  it  in 
1848,  it  was  overgrown  with  weeds  and  brambles.  It 
was  erected  by  his  grandnephew,  W.  Herkimer.  The 
consecrated  spot  is  in  the  possession  of  strangers. 

"  Nine  days  after  the  battle  when  his  wound  had  be- 
come gangrenous,  an  amputation  was  thought  nece» 


INDIAN  ATR0CST1ES—MISS  M'CREA  MASSACRED.  359 

and  broke  through  the  line  of  the  besiegers.  He  was  soon  after  joined  by  an 
effective  force  under  Arnold — who  carried  consternation  and  death  to  every 
battle-field  he  ever  entered — whom  Schuyler  had  sent  for  the  relief  of  the 
fort.  St.  Leger's  force  was  routed.  He  abandoned  his  camp  after  being 
robbed  and  deserted  by  a  part  of  his  Indian  allies,  and  was  compelled  by  the 
rest  to  retreat  into  Canada.  His  design  was  utterly  defeated,  and  tranquillity 
was  once  more  restored  to  the  lovely  vale  of  the  Mohawk. 

The  Employment  of  Indian  Allies  begins  to  be  considered  a  Failure. — An 
incident  which  occurred  about  this  time,  began  to  open  the  eyes  of  our  ene- 
mies, and  worked  serious  injury  to  the  British  arms.  It  was  the  massacre  of 
Miss  M'Crea  of  Fort  Edward.  This  beautiful  girl  was  betrothed  to  Captain 
Jones,  of  Burgoyne's  division.  Uniting  her  fortunes  with  those  of  her  Eng- 
lish lover,  she  put  herself  under  the  protection  of  Indian  scouts,  who  had 
been  sent  by  Captain  Jones,  and  started  through  the  forest.  A  second  party 
of  Indians  despatched  by  the  lover  to  aid  the  first,  quarrelled  with  those  they 
met,  and  a  rivalry  sprang  up.  A  quarrel  ensued  on  the  question  which 
party  should  deliver  the  lady.  When  the  second  party  were  likely  to  get  her 
in  their  possession,  those  who  had  taken  her  in  the  beginning,  tied  her  to  a 
tree  and  shot  her.  This  incident  revealed  more  clearly  than  any  preceding 
event  had  done,  the  atrocity  with  which  the  British  commanders  were  deter- 
mined to  carry  on  this  war  j  for  it  was  evident  that  they  would  call  into  requisi- 
tion the  wild  and  unfettered  passions  of  savage  tribes,  to  deepen  the  tide  of 
blood  which  they  had  set  flowing  through  the  devoted  Colonies. 

The  reaction  was  immense.  For  many  miles  around  the  neighborhood, 
the  people  rose  and  rushed  to  the  American  encampment.  The  massacre  of 
Miss  M'Crea  was  no  more  atrocious  than  multitudes  of  others.  But  it  came 
nearer  to  our  enemies,  and  began  to  open  their  eyes  to  the  savagery  of  em- 
ploying such  infernal  instruments  in  warfare.  Bancroft  sums  it  up  as  follows  : 
"  The  employment  of  Indian  allies  had  failed.  The  king,  the  ministry,  and 
in  due  time,  the  British  Parliament  were  informed  officially  that  the  wild  red- 
men  '  treacherously  committed  ravages  upon  their  friends  ;  '  that  '  they  could 
not  be  controlled  ; '  that  '  they  killed  their  captives  after  the  fashion  of  their 
tribes  ; '  that  '  there  was  infinite  difficulty  in  managing  them  ; '  that  'they  grew 
more  and  more  unreasonable  and  importunate.'  Could  the  government  of  a 
civilized  state  insist  on  courting  their  alliance  ?  When  the  Seneca  warriors, 
returning  to  their  lodges,  told  the  story  of  the  slaughter  of  their  chiefs,  their 
villages  rang  with  the  howls  of  mourners,  the  yells  of  rage.  We  shall  see 
interested  British  emissaries,  acting  under  the  orders  of  Germain  and  the 
king,  make  the  life  of  these  savages  a  succession  of  revenges,  and  lead  them 
on  to  the  wreaking  of  all  their  wrath  in  blood."  ■ 

sary  ;  but  it  was  performed  by  a  drunken  surgeon,  book,  sank  back  upon  his  pillow  and  expired.     Stona 

who  neglected  it  till  it  was  evident  that  he  was  dying  justly  observes  : — '  If  Socrates  died  like  a  philosopher 

of  the  unstaunched  hemorrhage.     Seeing  that  he  must  and    Rousseau    like    an     unbelieving    sentimentalist 

soon   die,   he  called   for  the    Bible,    and    read    com-  General  Herkimer  died  like  a  Christian  H«RO.,m— 

posedly,  in  the  presence  of  his  family  and  others,  the  Field-Book,  vol.  L,  pp.  260-261. 
thirty-eighth  Psalm,  applying  the  deep,  penitential  con-  '  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  381-382. 

fessions  of  the  poem  to  his  own  case.     He  closed  the 


360      SCHUYLER  SUPERSEDED— BURGOYNE'S  EXTREMITY, 

Schuyler  Superseded. — This  general  was  not  popular  in  Congress,  which 
rendered  it  easier  for  Gates  with  his  strong  body  of  supporters,  to  reach  the 
point  on  which  his  restless  ambition  had  been  long  fixed,  and  he  was  sent  to 
supersede  Schuyler.  It  was  alleged  at  the  time,  that  Schuyler  was  unfairly 
treated  ;  and  his  friends  were  the  more  indignant,  since  after  St.  Clair's  dis- 
asters, he  had  soon  gathered  an  army  of  thirteen  thousand  men  around  him, 
with  fair  prospects  of  a  successful  prosecution  of  the  campaign.  The  injustice, 
however,  if  such  it  were,  was  forgotten  in  the  glorious  victory  of  Saratoga, 
which  soon  afterwards  followed.  But  Schuyler  endeared  himself  the  more  to 
his  friends  by  his  subsequent  conduct ;  for  through  all  his  future  career,  he 
never  allowed  the  insult  to  leave  the  slightest  taint  upon  his  patriotism. 
It  was  enough  for  him  that  fortune  had  smiled  upon  our  arms,  and  it  did  not 
ruffle  the  serenity  of  his  noble  spirit,  that  she  was  already  smiling  upon  his 
successful  rival. 

Burgoyne'  s  Extremity* — The  stars  were  fighting  against  the  British  general, 
and  the  prospects  of  his  carrying  out  the  campaign  which  had  been  so  suc- 
cessfully fought  out  on  paper  in  the  closet  of  the  King  of  England,  was  grow- 
ing darker  every  hour.  As  he  afterwards  himself  said  :  '  I  could  not  have  an- 
ticipated any  serious  obstacle  to  the  advance  of  St.  Leger  with  his  numerous 
and  trusted  allies ;  nor  did  I  suppose  that  General  Clinton  would  be  arrested 
by  any  little  obstacles  in  the  Highlands  of  the  Hudson,  starting  as  he  did  from 
New  York  with  a  strong  force  so  completely  appointed.  The  greatest  curse 
of  the  whole  thing  was,  that  I  was  placed  where  I  could  neither  advance  nor 
retreat,  nor  hold  my  ground ;  there  was  nothing  left  but  for  me  to  fight,  and 
win  or  lose  the  day,  as  the  Fates  would  have  it.'  His  Canadian  allies  were 
getting  discouraged,  and  the  ardor  of  his  savages  was  somewhat  cooled  by 
learning  that  some  of  the  warriors  of  the  Six  Nations  l  were  joining  the  camp 
of  his  enemy.  With  less  modesty  than  became  a  commander-in-chief,  Bur- 
goyne  boasted  that  he  would  eat  his  Christmas  dinner  in  Albany.  Gates  had 
heard  of  this  silly  boast,  and  equalled  it ; — '  Then  it  will  be  a  dinner  of  cold 
lead.'  Without  desiring  to  detract  from  the  merit  of  General  Gates,  it  is  but 
just  to  say  that,  at  this  time,  he  was  in  command  of  the  largest  body  of  troops 
ever  massed  together  under  one  commander  during  the  Revolution  ;  a  degree 
of  order  and  subordination  almost  unknown  had  been  introduced  into  his 
camp  ;  that  their  ammunitions  and  equipments  were  in  some  measure  ade- 
quate to  the  work  before  them,  and  that  no  great  body  of  men  of  higher  char- 
acter, intelligence  or  patriotism,  was  ever  mustered  into  the  American 
service.  The  strength,  manhood,  brains  and  valor  of  New  York,  New  Eng- 
land and  Virginia  were  completely  represented.  Burgoyne's  men  knew  little 
of  Gates  or  Schuyler,  but  they  had  found  out  who  Stark  was,  to  their  heart's 
content.  Burgoyne  always  said  that  Stark  was  the  only  name  that  ever  raised 
a  dread  in  his  army ;  and  it  is  doubtful  if,  with  the  exception  of  Washington, 
he  himself  ever  was  afraid  of  any  other  American  general. 

1  See  Campbell's  Border  War/are  of  New  York,  and  Stone's  Life  of  Brant,  for  an  account  of  thest  tribes. 


BURGOYNE  PREPARES  FOR  BATTLE.  3*i 

Gates  assumes  Command  of  the  Army  of  the  North,  August  19,  1777.— 
After  liberating  the  Mohawk  Valley,  Arnold,  with  his  victorious  battalions, 
and  Morgan,  with  his  veteran  regiment  of  riflemen,  joined  the  Continental 
troops,  which  made  Gates'  command  outnumber  Burgoyne's  German  and 
British  regulars;  while  his  large  accessions  of  militia  from  New  York  and 
New  England,  with  fresh  arrivals  of  small  arms  and  artillery  from  France, 
recently  landed  at  Portsmouth,  left  him  superior  to  his  antagonist. 

Burgoyne  prepares  for  Battle. — The  British  general  now  began  a  final 
movement,  which,  if  successful,  would  cover  him  with  glory ;  while  the  dis- 
grace of  a  failure  could  be  thrown  on  his  superiors,  who  might  be  held  respon- 
sible for  a  disaster  incurred  in  obeying  their  orders.  He  was  determined  to 
cut  his  way  through  the  American  lines  to  Albany,  or  lose  his  army.  Before 
sundown,  September  13,  his  fine  train  of  artillery  had  crossed  over  the  Hudson 
on  a  bridge  of  boats  at  Schuylerville ;  but  formidable  as  was  the  appearance 
he  now  presented,  before  daylight  streaked  the  east  on  the  morning  of  the 
1 8th,  his  star  began  to  lose  its  brightness.  Colonel  John  Brown,  of  Berkshire 
County,  Massachusetts,  had  been  despatched  by  Lincoln  from  Manchester, 
with  five  hundred  light  troops  to  harass  the  rear  of  the  enemy.  Surprising 
the  outppsts  of  Ticonderoga,  he  liberated  a  hundred  American  prisoners,  cap- 
tured four  companies  of  regulars,  and  the  guards  at  the  portage  between  Lake 
George  and  Lake  Champlain,  with  their  arms  and  cannon,  and  destroying  a 
hundred  and  fifty  vessels,  among  which  were  several  gunboats,  and  an  armed 
sloop.  The  next  four  days,  Burgoyne's  army,  by  stopping  to  rebuild  bridges, 
advanced  hardly  as  many  miles.  But  on  the  morning  of  the  19th,  encounter- 
ing Gates'  army,  now  strongly  posted  on  Bemis's  heights,  he  saw  there  was 
no  way  to  victory,  except  by  dislodging  them  at  once.  He  formed  his  entire 
force  in  three  columns.  The  left,  under  Riedesel,  with  the  heaviest  field-bat- 
teries, took  the  road  through  the  meadows  on  the  bank  of  the  Hudson  ;  Bur- 
goyne led  the  centre  in  person  across  a  deep  ravine ;  while  the  right  column, 
under  Fraser,  following  the  circuitous  ridge,  advanced  towards  the  heights  on 
the  left  of  the  Americans, — the  only  point  from  which  they  could  be  suc- 
cessfully assailed.  Along  the  rear  of  these  advancing  columns,  hung  hordes 
of  Canadians,  Tories,  and  Savages,  thirsting  for  plunder  and  blood.  There 
were  three  major-generals  on  the  British  side — on  ours  not  one  in  the  field.1 

A  Glimpse  of  the  Battle. — The  Americans  used  no  artillery  that  day.  The 
work  was  done  by  the  separate  regiments,  which  being  well  handled  by  their 
officers,  and  rigidly  adhering  to  the  orders  of  the  chief  commander — suggested 
in  the  main  beyond  all  doubt  by  Arnold  who  watched  the  battle — won  the 
field  which  was  obstinately  contested  for  so  many  hours.  Morgan,  with  his 
veteran  regiment  of  riflemen,  did  fearful  execution.3     Scammei's  New  Hamp- 

1  The  impression  that  Arnold  engaged  in,  instead  of  the  batde,  as  reported  by  Chief-Justice  Marshall ;  and 

directing  this   battle  is   a  mistake.      For  this   I   nave  other  witnesses  whom   Gordon  regarded   as  reliable, 

the  authority  of  Robert  R.  Livingstone,  in  a  letter  to  See  his  history,  vol.  ii.,  p.  551. 

General  Wishington,  written   January  14th,  1778.  as  '•»' Next  to  Washington,  Morgan  was  the  best  office* 

well  as  the  testimony  of  Wilkinson,  who  was  present  at  whom  Virginia  sent  into  the  field,  though  she  raised  ik 


362  FIRST  BA  TTLE  OF  BEMISS  HEIGHTS. 

shire  battalion,  and  Cook's  two  regiments  of  Connecticut  militia,  by  their  rapid, 
dexterous  and  daring  movements,  had  much  to  do  in  the  hardest  work  of 
the  day.  But  where  all  did  so  well,  Cilley's  Continental  regiment,  the  Con- 
necticut militia  under  Cook,  the  Virginia  riflemen  under  Morgan,  and  the 
New  Hampshire  men  under  Scammel,  carried  away  the  chief  glories  of  the 
field.  It  was  evident  enough  at  the  time,  that,  if  an  able  general  officer  had 
led  the  army  in  person,  the  route  of  Burgoyne  might  have  been  complete. 

The  Night  after  the  Battle. — Evening  was  coming  on,  and  the  long  engage- 
ment having  nearly  exhausted  the  ammunition  of  the  Americans,  they  with- 
drew quietly  and  in  good  order,  taking  with  them  their  wounded  and  a  hun- 
dred prisoners.  Burgoyne' s  divisions  bivouacked  on  the  field,  too  exhausted 
to  bestow  much  care  on  their  disabled,  or  to  bury  their  dead.  Including  the 
wounded  and  the  dead,  the  American  loss  was  three  hundred  and  twenty, 
while  the  enemy's  exceeded  double  that  number.  Arnold,  who  doubtless 
from  the  jealousy  of  Gates,  was  not  allowed  to  engage  in  the  fight,  saw  with 
the  eye  of  a  consummate  soldier  where  a  complete  victory  might  have 
been  won  when  Burgoyne' s  columns  began  to  waver  towards  evening,  and  he 
expressed  this  opinion  to  Gates.  Again,  when  the  next  morning  had  exposed 
the  desperate  condition  of  the  British  army,  he  pressed  his  views  so  urgently 
that  the  less  resolute,  if  not  timid  commander,  resented  the  interference,  and 
a  quarrel  ensued.  The  fiery  Arnold  demanded  a  passport  for  Philadelphia, 
which  Gates  readily  granted  ;  but,  '  repenting  of  his  rashness,  the  restless  and 
insubordinate  man  lingered  in  the  camp,  though  he  could  no  longer  obtain  ac- 
cess to  Gates,  nor  a  command.1 

Burgoyne  sends  to  Sir  Henry  Clifton  for  help  ; — but  Clinton  was  a  hundred 
and  fifty  miles  away  to  the  south,  and  every  hour  the  northern  commander's 
position  was  becoming  more  desperate.3     He  must  meet  his  destiny — he  pre- 

statue  to  the  incomparable  leader  of  her  light  troops.* —  among  his  companions  those  whom  it  was  wise  to  be- 

Bancroft,    vol.    be.,   p.  131.      Among  the    troops   who  trust ;  and  a  reciprocal  sympathy  made  the  obedience 

hastened  to  Washington's  camp  at  Cambridge  was  a  of   his  soldiers   an    act    of     affectionate    confidence, 

company  of  riflemen  from  Virginia,    commanded  by  Wherever  he  was  posted   in  the  battle-field,  the  fight 

Daniel   Morgan,  whose  early  life  was  so   obscured  by  was  sure  to  be  waged  with  fearlessness,  good  judgment, 

Eoverty  that  no  one  remembered  his  parents  or  his  and  massive  energy.  Of  all  the  officers  whom  Virginia 
irth-place,  or  if  he  had  sister  or  brother.  Self-sup-  sent  into  the  war,  next  to  Washington,  Morgan  was 
ported  by  daily  labor,  he  was  yet  fond  of  study,  and  the  greatest :  equal  to  every  occasion  in  the  camp  or 
self-taught,  he  learned  by  slow  degrees  to  write  well,  before  an  enemy,  unless  it  were  that  he  knew  not  how 
Migrating  from  New  Jersey,  he  became  a  wagoner  in  to  be  idle,  or  to  retreat.  In  ten  days  after  he  received 
Virginia  in  time  to  witness  Braddock's  expedition.  In  his  commission,  he  attracted  to  himself  from  the  valley, 
1774,  he  again  saw  something  of  war,  having  descended  a  company  of  ninety-six  backwoodsmen.  His  first 
the  Ohio  with  Dunmore.  The  danger  of  his  country  lieutenant  was  John  Humphreys  ;  his  second,  William 
called  him  into  action  which  was  his  appropriate  sphere.  Heth  ;  his  sergeant,  Charles  Porterfield.  No  captain 
In  person  he  was  more  than  six  feet  high  and  well  ever  commanded  braver  soldiers,  or  was  better  support- 
proportioned,  of  an  imposing  presence,  moving  with  ed  by  his  officers;  in  twenty-one  days  they  marched 
strength  and  grace,  of  a  hardy  constitution  that  defied  from  Winchester  in  Virginia,  to  Cambridge. — Ban- 
fatigue,  hunger,  and  cold.     His  open  countenance  was  croft,  vol.  viii.,  pp.  62-63. 

the  mirror  of  a  frank  and  ingenuous  nature.    He  could  *•  The  historian  also  says,  vol.  ix.,  p.  412.  that  '  the 

glow  with  vehement  anger,  but  passion  never  mastered  British   dead  were  buried  promiscuously,  except  that 

his  power  of  discernment,  and  his  disposition  was  sweet  officers  were  thrown  into  holes  by  themselves  •    in  one 

and  peaceful,  so  that  he  delighted  in  acts  of  kindness,  pit  three  of  the  twentieth  regiment,  of  whom  the  eldest 

never  harbored  malice  or  revenge,  and  made  his  house  was  not  more  than  seventeen.' 

the  home  of  cheerfulness  and  hospitality.  His  courage  i  In  Bancroft's  fine,  and  somewhat  elaborate  de- 
was  not  an  idle  quality;  it  sprang  from  the  intense  scription  of  this  campaign,  he  thus  speaks  of  Burgoyne' 3 
force  of  his  will,  which  bore  him  on  to  do  his  duty  with  condition  :  'The  Americans  broke  down  the  bridges 
an  irresistible  impetuosity.  His  faculties  were  only  which  he  had  built  in  his  rear,  and  so  swarmed  in  the 
quickened  by  the  nearness  of  danger,  which  he  was  woods,  that  he  could  gain  no  just  idea  of  tl  eir  situation. 
Wire  to  make  the  best  preparations  to  meet.  An  intui-  His  foraging  parties  and  advanced  po^ts  were  ha" 
live  perception  of  character  assisted  him  in  choosing  rassed ;  horses  grew  thin  and  weak  ;  the  hospital  wa 


BURGOYNKS  LAST  BATTLE.  3(13 

pared  for  it  like  a  brave  man.  No  tidings  came  from  Clinton,  ar.d  finding 
that  he  must  go  into  the  struggle  alone,  he  prepared  for  a  reconnoissance  in 
force.  Fifteen  hundred  picked  men,  under  his  ablest  commanders,  advanced 
in  the  afternoon  of  October  7th,  to  within  half  a  mile  of  Gates'  position,  and 
offered  battle.  The  Americans  entered  the  conflict  with  coolness  and  confi- 
dence. The  battle  was  fiercely  contested  on  both  sides.  Every  regiment 
moved  to  its  work  with  order,  and  held  its  ground  with  steadiness  :  not  a  bat 
talion  wavered,  not  an  officer  was  at  fault. 

Although  Burgoyne  had  led  only  fifteen  hundred  men  from  his  camp,  the 
rest  of  the  army  was  in  supporting  distance,  and  his  entire  available  force 
could  be  brought  to  bear  during  the  long  conflict.  Rank  and  file  on  both 
sides  seemed  to  understand  that  the  fate  of  both  armies  would  be  decided 
that  day  j  and  it  is  difficult,  with  the  full  knowledge  we  have  of  that  battle,  to 
determine  whether  the  honors  of  the  field  should  be  accorded  to  the  general- 
ship of  Burgoyne,  the  admirable  manner  in  which  Fraser,  Breyman,  Riedesel, 
and  Phillips,  managed  their  troops,  and  the  unshaken  steadiness  with  which 
they  fought  all  through — or  to  the  brilliant  conduct  of  the  American  officers, 
sustained  as  they  were  by  the  steady  valor  of  the  patriot  army,  and  all  fired 
by  the  gallant  and  desperate  heroism  of  Arnold,  who  could  be  restrained  no 
longer  by  Gates,  and  in  defiance  of  orders,  sprang  upon  a  horse  and  dashed 
into  the  thickest  of  the  fight,  where  without  a  command  whole  battalions 
followed  his  intrepid  lead.  During  the  Revolution  there  was  no  better  fight- 
ing by  the  republicans  or  their  invaders.  Straight  into  the  mouth  of  the 
British  batteries  of  twelve-pounders,  heavily  charged  with  grape-shot  and 
well  handled,  our  regiments  advanced,  closing  up  their  ranks  as  fast  as  their 
men  were  mowed  down.  Nothing  could  withstand  their  deadly  fire,  or  im- 
petuous charges.  While  Poor's  brigade  and  Broeck's  militia  engaged  Ack- 
land's  grenadiers,  Morgan  was  making  a  circuit  by  one  of  his  brilliant  evolu- 
tions to  flank  the  British  right,  and  Dearborn  was  dashing  down  with  his 
light  infantry  from  the  heights.  Not  long  after  the  battle  had  begun  to  wax 
hot,  Fraser  was  struck  in  the  head  by  a  rifle  bullet,  and  the  British  grenadiers 
broke  and  fled,  leaving  their  heroic  commander,  seriously  wounded.  Bur- 
goyne's  first  aid,  Sir  Francis  Clark,  was  struck  from  his  saddle  on  his  way  to 
rally  the  Brunswickers.  The  gallant  John  Brooks — afterwards  governor  of  his 
State — with  a  Massachusetts  regiment  was  storming  the  stockade  redoubts 
on  the  right  of  the  British  camp,  while  Breyman,  now  exposed  in  front  and 
rear,  fell  mortally  wounded.  It  became  evident  that  the  enemy  was  losing  the 
field. 

But  Burgoyne' s  spirit  rose  with  the  occasion.  Officers  on  his  staff  were 
wounded  and  fell  with  their  wounded  horses.  A  shot  meant  for  Burgoyne, 
dropped  the  officer  nearest  to  him  dead.  A  bullet  flew  through  his  hat ;  others 
grazed  his  body.      Where  a  battalion  or  regiment  wavered,   he  dashed  in 

cumbered  with  at  least  eight  hundred  sick  and  wounded  wing;  he  was  followed  by  two  thousand  militia.    Tha 

men.      One-third  part  of  the  soldiers'  rations  was  re-  Indians  melted  away  from  Burgoyne,  and  by  the  zeal 

trenched.     While  the  British  army  declined   in  num-  of  Schuyler,  contrary  to  the  policy  of  Gates,  a  small 

ber,  Gates  was  constantly  reinforced.     On  the  twenty-  band,  chiefly  of  Oneidas,  joined  the  American 

second  Lincoln  arrived,  and  took  command  of  the  right  —-Ibid. 


364  BUR  GO  YNEPS  SURRENDER. 

that  direction  and  breathed  new  fire  into  their  ranks ;  and  could  the  field 
have  been  won  by  mortal  power,  he  would  have  gained  it.  But  the  terrible 
charges  of  the  patriot  regiments  and  battalions  could  not  be  resisted. 
And  so  the  battle  raged  till  long  after  sunset.  It  was  ten  o'clock  at  night 
before  Burgoyne  gave  orders  to  retreat.  But  there  was  no  time  for  repose 
that  night.  On  the  outer  verge  of  the  field  from  which  he  retreated,  an  im- 
provised hospital  was  receiving  the  wounded  and  the  dying,  to  join  a  thousand 
of  their  comrades  who  had  fallen  sick  from  fatigue  and  exposure,  or  been 
disabled  in  former  engagements.  On  the  rising  ground  beyond  this  scene  of 
suffering  and  defeat,  he  gathered  his  shattered  army. 

The  Surrender  of  Burgoyne.  —When  the  sun  of  the  next  morning  rose 
over  the  field  of  yesterday's  struggle,  Burgoyne  saw  that  the  work  was  done 
> — the  fate  of  his  army  was  sealed.  He  could  not  attribute  it  to  his  lack  of 
courage ;  and  to  his  dying  day,  never  seemed  to  have  been  conscious  that  in 
lack  of  judgment,  nature  had  been  too  niggardly,  to  stamp  him  with  the  im- 
press of  a  great  commander.  The  consciousness  of  valor  transported  him 
with  ceaseless  illusions  of  victory.  He  followed  his  star  till  it  vanished 
like  a  miserable  ignis  fatuus  in  the  morass  of  defeat.1 

When  another  night  of  gloom  had  closed  in  after  the  disheartening  day 
that  followed  the  battle,  Burgoyne  abandoned  his  sick  and  bleeding  men  in 
the  hospital,  and  began  his  retreat.  When  within  two  miles  of  Saratoga,  on 
the  night  of  the  10th,  finding  a  flight  across  the  Hudson  impossible,  he 
forded  the  Fishkill,  and  choosing  the  best  position  he  could,  made  his  final 
encampment.  Only  one  hope  was  left  of  escape  ;  but  a  reconnoitering 
party  sent  out  found  that  Stark  held  the  river  at  Fort  Edward !  This  in- 
domitable man  had  been  greeted  by  two  thousand  recruits  who  rushed  to 
join  the  hero  after  the  battle  of  Bennington,  and  he  had  now  returned  with 
a  powerful  corps  of  New  Hampshire  militia  eager  for  battle.  The  last  hope 
being  cut  off,  in  a  council  of  war,  Burgoyne' s  proposal  to  surrender  was 
unanimously  approved.  Transported  with  a  triumph  which  good  fortune, 
more  than  generalship  had  accorded  to  him,  Gates  allowed  the  victory  to  be 
shorn  of  some  of  its  fruits,  by  signing  a  convention  which  stipulated  for  a 
passage  for  his  army  from  Boston  to  Great  Britain,  on  condition  of  their 
not  serving  again  during  the  war  in  North  America,  when  he  should  have  de- 
manded, what  he  could  instantly  have  enforced,  and  what  he  was  by  all  laws 
of  war  entitled  to,  an  unconditional  surrender.  But  it  was  not  an  hour  for 
censure — the  American  people  were  satisfied.     The  British  army  were  to  lay 

1  Among  the  officers  who  fell  wounded  or  dead  that  lips,  and  Reidsel,  and  none  beside,  joined  the  train  ; 

day,  there  were  many  whose  names  were  cherished  for  and  amidst  the  ceaseless  booming  of  the  American  ar- 

their  noble  qualities,   by  friends  on  both  sides  of  the  tillery,  the  order  for  the  burial  of  the  dead  was  strictly 

Atlantic.    "  All  persons  sorrowed  over  Fraser,  so  much  observed  in  the  twilight  over  his  grave.     Never  more 

love  had  he  inspired.     He  questioned  the  surgeon  ea-  shall  he  chase  the  red   deer  through   the  heather  of 

gerly  as  to  his  wound,   and  when  he  found  that  he  Strath  Err.ick,  or  guide  the  skiff  across  the  fathomless 

must  go  from  wife  and  children,  that  fame  and  promo-  lake  of  central  Scotland,  or  muse  over  the  ruin  of  the 

tion  and  life  were  gliding  from  before  his  eyes,  he  cried  Stuarts  on  the  moor  of  Drum-mossie,  or  dream  of  glory 

out  in  his  agony  :    •  Damned  ambition  ! '     At  sunset  beside  the  crystal  waters  of  the  Ness.     Death  in  itself 

of  the  eighth,  as  his  body,  attended  by  the  officers  of  is  not  terrible  ;  but  he  came  to  America  for  selfish  ad* 

his  family,  was  borne  by  soldiers  of  his  corps  to  the  vancement,  and  though  bravely  true  as  a  soldier,  h« 

great  redo  ibt  above  the  Hudson,  where  he  had  asked  to  died  uncon  soled." — Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  418-419. 
be  buried,  the   three  major-generals,  Burgoyne,  Phii- 


CONSEQUENCES  OF  THE  NORTHERN  VICTORIES.  36$ 

down  their  arms — almost  on  the  terms  their  commander  had  dictated.  The 
deed  was  not  witnessed  by  the  patriot  army ;  a  detachment  from  their  body 
marched  into  the  British  camp  to  the  tune  of  'Yankee  Doodle,'  and  'while,' 
says  Lafayette,1 '  a  brilliant  troop,  covered  with  gold,  filed  out  with  Burgoyne, 
they  encountered  Gates  and  his  officers,  all  clothed  in  plain  gray  cloth.'  In- 
cluding officers,  they  numbered  five  thousand  seven  hundred  and  ninety-one, 
exclusive  of  eighteen  hundred  and  fifty-six  prisoners  of  war,  embracing  the  sick 
and  wounded  whom  Burgoyne  had  abandoned. 

The  Loss  of  the  British  in  this  Northern  Campaign : — In  killed,  disabled, 
and  prisoners,  it  was  reckoned  at  ten  thousand  men.  The  trophies  of  war 
were  forty-two  brass  cannon,  five  thousand  muskets  and  small  arms,  with  large 
munitions  of  war ;  the  ordnance  and  arms  being  the  best  then  known,  and 
probably  exceeding  in  number  all  others  of  equal  value  in  the  federal  army. 

Consequences  of  the  Victories. — It  is  impossible  at  our  day,  to  form  any 
adequate  conception  of  the  mingled  feelings  of  relief  and  exultation  which 
filled  the  nation.  Washington's  heart  swelled  with  gratitude,  and  he  wept 
long  with  joy.  It  was  the  greatest  victory  that  had  yet  crowned  our  arms. 
Since  the  battle  of  Long  Island,  no  such  formidable  force  had  been  brought 
against  the  patriots  in  one  engagement :  nor  had  there  been  up  to  that  time, 
nor  was  there  afterwards,  a  series  of  engagements  in  any  one  campaign, 
which  reflected  more  glory  upon  the  patriot  arms,  or  more  lustre  upon  the 
valor  of  British  and  American  soldiers.  The  candid  judgments  of  European 
writers,  military  and  civilian,  from  that  day  to  this,  will  be  found  by  the  care- 
ful reader,  to  be  fairly  summed  tip  in  the  few  words  just  written. 

The  shadows  had  lain  so  thick  over  the  cause  of  independence  that  the 
spirit  of  Toryism  had  become  rampant.  Throughout  Pennsylvania  particu- 
larly, it  was  said,  that  the  enemies  of  the  Republic  outnumbered  its  friends. 
But  the  news  of  the  northern  victories  inflamed  the  spirit  of  patriotism  on  all 
sides,  and  everywhere  disloyalty  hung  its  head.  Men  began  to  treat  Toryism 
as  treason.  The  lines  were  drawn  straighter  between  republicans  and 
monarchists.  From  the  lips  of  preachers  of  all  sects,  bolder  words  fell ; — 
'  Choose  ye  this  day  whom  ye  will  serve,'  was  the  text  which  rang  from  many 
a  pulpit  that  had  been  cold  or  dumb.  With  the  overpowering  force  Howe 
was  bringing  against  the  national  army  on  the  Delaware,  the  belief  even  in 
Washington's  ability  to  hold  his  own,  was  giving  way.  How  deep  would 
have  been  the  public  depression,  or  how  great  the  disaster,  could  Clinton 
have  joined  his  forces  with  Burgoyne,  and  gained  permanent  possession  of  the 
Hudson  river,  it  is  impossible  to  conjecture.  But  with  the  good  news  from 
the  north,  a  new  feeling  spread  over  the  country  ;  everywhere  the  clouds 
began  to  lift,  and  the  mists  of  doubt  to  be  dissolved.  When  the  British  gar- 
rison at  Ticonderoga  heard  of  Burgoyne' s  defeat,  they  fled.  The  victorious 
Americans  looked  up  towards  the  north,  and  saw  no  enemy  to  contend  with 

1  Meiioirs,  vol.  i.f  p.  ft* 


366  EFFECT  OF  THE  NEWS  IN  EUROPE. 

this  side  of  the  St.  Lawrence.  The  yells  of  the  savage  had  died  away  on 
the  Mohawk.  The  alliance  between  the  Tories  of  Johnson  and  Butler,  and 
the  warriors  of  Brant,  had  for  the  time  being  at  least,  been  broken  up.  Sif 
Henry  Clinton  received  the  tidings  of  the  British  disaster  while  he  was 
sailing  up  the  Hudson,  and  satisfied  with  the  capture  of  Forts  Clinton  and 
Montgomery,  he  again  turned  his  prows  to  New  York,  leaving  to  Vaughan 
his  worthy  subordinate,  the  brutal  work  of  firing  the  homes  of  the  patriots 
on  both  banks  of  the  Hudson,  and  burning  down  the  unprotected  town  of 
Kingston. 

The  Effect  of  the  News  in  Europe — In  France. — It  was  to  be  still  more  aus- 
picious to  our  cause  abroad.  The  joy  that  spread  over  France,  where  the 
fires  of  a  great  democratic  revolution  were  being  kindled,  woke  up  the  wildest 
enthusiasm  among  all  classes,  and  the  public  indignation  of  Europe  could  not 
be  restrained  against  the  barbarous  policy  of  impressing  German  troops  into 
the  service  of  British  despotism.  Those  princes  who  had  kidnapped  their 
own  subjects,  and  sold  them  to  infamy  or  death  in  a  distant  land,  were 
obliged  to  defend  themselves  from  public  indignation.  The  Margrave  of 
Hesse,  who  had  entered  the  plea  of  legitimacy  and  feudal  rights  as  his  justifi- 
cation, was  answered  by  Mirabeau,  who  said,  '  When  power  breaks  the  com- 
pact which  secured  and  limited  its  rights,  then  resistance  becomes  a  duty. 
He  that  fights  to  recover  freedom,  exercises  a  lawful  right.  Insurrection  be- 
comes just.  There  is  no  crime  so  great  as  one  perpetrated  against  the  freedom 
of  peoples.'  This  greatest  of  all  the  French  orators  of  the  last  century, 
from  his  exile  in  Holland,  began  to  lift  that  trumpet  voice  for  the  cause  of 
humanity  and  civilization,  which  was  afterwards  to  make  the  battlements  of 
oppression  tremble  to  their  foundations.  He  had  witnessed  the  infamous 
spectacle  of  driving  the  German  soldiers  from  their  homes  to  fight  for  George 
III.,  and  he  sent  these  burning  words  through  Germany  : — *  What  new  mad- 
ness is  this  ?  Alas !  miserable  men,  you  burn  down,  not  the  camp  of  an 
enemy,  but  your  own  hopes  !  Germans  !  what  brand  do  you  suffer  to  be 
put  upon  your  foreheads  ?  You  war  against  a  people  who  have  never 
wronged  you ;  who  fight  for  a  righteous  cause  ;  and  set  you  the  noblest  pattern. 
They  break  their  chains.  Imitate  their  example.  Have  you  not  the  same 
claim  to  honor  and  right  as  your  princes  ?  Yes,  without  doubt.  Men  stand 
higher  than  princes.  Of  all  rulers  conscience  is  the  highest.  You,  peoples 
that  are  cheated,  humbled,  and  sold  !  Fly  to  America  !  There  embrace  your 
brothers.  In  the  spacious  places  of  refuge  which  they  open  to  suffering 
humanity,  learn  the  art  to  be  free  and  happy ;  the  art  to  apply  social  institu- 
tions to  the  advantage  of  every  member  of  society.' 

By  such  Promethean  hands  was  the  torch  of  liberty, — which  had  been 
borrowed  from  the  American  altar, — transmitted  to  the  European  nations. 

In  England. — The  success  of  our  arms  was  the  cause  of  scarcely  lesi 
gratulation  with  the  liberal  party  in  England.     Their  principles  had  never 


SITUATION  OF  LORD  NORTH.  36; 

changed,  and  their  sympathy  for  America  was  perhaps  warmer  than  c/er; 
but  from  the  distance  their  eyes  could  not  so  clearly  pierce  the  clouds  that 
hung  over  us,  and  it  seemed  likely  that  their  faith  in  our  principles  would  out- 
live their  confidence  in  our  success.  But  now  they  could  take  a  bolder  atti- 
tude. When  the  king,  on  the  20th  of  November,  opened  the  new  session  of 
Parliament,  he  seemed  more  fixed  than  ever  in  his  convictions,  and  still  mort 
obstinate  rn  his  determination  to  continue  the  war,  regardless  of  waste  of 
treasure  or  life.  The  news  of  Burgoyne's  overthrow  had  not  then  reached 
England,  and  therefore,  the  jnore  glory  to  Chatham  for  saying,  ■  My  Lords ! 
you  cannot  conquer  America.  In  three  campaigns  we  have  done  nothing,  and 
suffered  much.  You  may  swell  every  expense,  accumulate  every  assistance  you 
can  buy  or  borrow,  traffic  and  foster  with  every  little  pitiful  German  prince 
that  sells  and  sends  his  subjects  to  the  shambles  of  a  foreign  prince ;  your  ef- 
forts are  forever  vain  and  impotent,  doubly  so  from  this  mercenary  aid  on 
which  you  rely,  for  it  irritates  to  an  incurable  resentment.  If  I  were  an 
American,  as  I  am  an  Englishman,  while  a  foreign  troop  was  landed  in  my  coun- 
try, I  would  never  lay  down  my  arms  ;  never,  never,  never.'  Chatham  called 
for  conciliation  with  America  by  a  change  of  ministry  to  quench  '  the  barbari- 
ties of  the  horrible  hell-hounds  of  this  savage  war ; '  and  appealing  to  the 
patriotism  and  pride  of  England,  demanded  that  France  should  be  chastised 
for  her  insulting  interference  in  the  affairs  of  the  British  Empire.  In  the 
House  of  Commons,  Burke  plead  for  '  an  agreement  with  the  Americans  on 
the  best  terms  that  could  be  made ; '  and  Fox,  the  rising  young  giant  of  the 
English  political  world,  declared,  \  If  no  better  terms  can  be  had,  I  would 
treat  with  them  as  allies ;  nor  do  I  fear  the  consequences  of  their  inde- 
pendence.' 

The  Situation  of  Lord  North. — Had  this  statesman  been  gifted  with  a 
nobler  nature,  his  embarrassment  and  mortification  might  now  have  excited 
some  sympathy.  He  was  a  man  of  feeble  convictions,  but  they  were  in  the 
main  generous  and  just.  While  his  secret  sympathies  were  with  the  cause  of 
American  independence,  his  love  of  power  and  his  spirit  of  cringing  loyalty  to  the 
king,  made  him  an  obsequious,  although  unwilling  instrument,  of  the  bigoted 
monarch.  He  was  one  of  those  men  who  have  more  faith  in  compromises, 
than  in  adherence  to  principle.  He  could  not  bear  the  idea  of  the  defeat  of 
the  king's  forces  on  any  battle-field;  and  it  was  with  painful  feelings  of  morti- 
fication and  twinges  of  conscience,  harder  to  bear  than  the  misfortune  of  blind- 
ness and  the  ills  of  old  age,1  that  he  had  yielded  his  convictions  to  the  will 
of  his  sovereign. 

1  Returning  from  the  fatiguing  debate  of  the  2d  of  opportunity  which  never  could  recur,  and,  against  his 

December  on  the  state  of  the  nation,  Lord  North  re-  o?on  conviction,  without  opening  to  America  any  hope 

ceived  the  news  of  the  total  loss  of  Burgoyne's  army,  of  pacification,  to  adjourn  the  Parliament  to  the  20th 

He  was  so  agitated  that  he  could  neither  eat  nor  sleep,  of  January.     Those  who  were  near  Lord  North  in  his 

and  the  next  day  at  the  levee  his  distress  was  visible  old  age,  never  heard  him  murmur  at  his  having  become 

to  the  foreign  ministers.     He  desired  to  make  peace  blind;  'but  in  the  solitude  of  sleepless  nights  he  would 

by  giving  up  all  the  points  which  hau  been  in  dispute  sometimes  fall  into   very  low    spirits,  and  deeply  re- 

with  America,  or  to   retire  from  the  ministry.      Con-  proach  himself  for  having,  at  the  earnest  desire  of  the 

cession  after  defeat  was  humiliating  ;  but  there  must  king,  remained  in  administration  after  he  thought    that 

be  prompt  action  or  France  would  interfere.     .     .     It  peace  ought  to  have  been  made  wish  America.'—  Dan* 

was  the  king  who  persuaded  his  minister  to  forego  the  croft,  vol.  ix.,  chap,  xxviii. 


368  FROM  VERSAILLES  TO  VALLEY  FORGE. 

Passing  from  Versailles  to  Valley  Forge. — Madness  ruled  the  ministry  of 
George  III.,  and  our  friends  in  England  fought  our  battles  with  almost  fruitless 
results  at  the  time.  But  they  were  piling  up  mountains  of  justification  for  our 
conduct,  and  writing  epitaphs  of  glory  and  gratitude  in  the  hearts  of  Americans 
to  \  the  last  syllable  of  recorded  time.'  We  turn  even  from  them  for  a  while, 
with  the  assurance  that  we  shall  meet  them  again  ;  for  nearly  all  but  Chatham 
lived  to  see  the  young  Republic  rise  into  the  sunshine  of  independence.  As 
for  the  King  of  England,  and  his  Parliament,  and  the  ministers  of  his  despotic 
will,  their  acts  no  longer  interested  the  American  people.  We  had  had 
enough  of  them ;  and  for  good  or  evil,  every  American  statesman,  and  the 
great  mass  of  our  people,  were  willing  enough  to  leave  them  to  ■  gang  their 
ain  gait.'  But  our  fathers  were  looking  with  intense  interest  at  what  was  tak- 
ing place  on  the  other  side  of  the  British  Channel  •  for,  after  all,  the  hardest 
battle  of  the  Revolution  was  to  be  waged  in  Paris — there  our  mightiest  victory 
was  to  be  won.     Franklin  was  at  Versailles  ! 

Before  we  look  into  the  gorgeous  palace  of  Versailles,  reared  by  the  pride, 
and  embellished  by  the  taste  of  Louis  XIV.,  and  which  was  to  become  the 
scene  where  the  claims  of  the  young  Republic  were  to  be  urged  and  ac 
knowledged,  we  must  visit  the  bleak  quarters  of  Washington  at  Valley 
Forge,  where  the  gloomiest  winter — 1 777-1 778 — in  the  life  of  the  patriot 
leader  and  his  army  was  passed.  This  record  must  be  cut  short ;  for  although 
the  interval  was  filled  with  activity,  and  the  fortunes  of  war  were  alternating 
between  victory  and  defeat,  yet  they  belong  to  those  minute  and  extended 
relations  which  are  excluded  from  the  scope  of  our  record.  In  a  few  lines 
we  can  trace  the  current  of  military  affairs  from  the  close  of  May,  when 
Washington  left  his  headquarters  at  Morristown,  until  the  summer  campaign 
was  over,  and  he  had  moved  from  his  last  position — White  Marsh,  December 
11,  1777 — into  his  winter  quarters  at  Valley  Forge.  Although  the  dreary 
winter  season  admitted  of  no  aggressive  movement  on  either  side,  yet  it  was 
not  wasted  in  idleness.  The  exposure  of  the  troops  to  the  inclemencies  of  the 
weather,  and  the  privations  they  went  through,  called  for  the  utmost  vigilance 
in  warding  off  disease,  and  every  precaution  and  remedy  within  the  reach  of 
the  science  of  that  day,  was  sedulously  resorted  to.1 

Howe's  Plan. — If  he  had  settled  upon  one  for  the  campaign — which  is  more 
than  doubtful — he  succeeded  in  concealing  it.  He  seemed  to  be  equally  pre- 
pared to  co-operate  with  Burgoyne  on  the  North,  and  in  the  event  of  his 
success  or  defeat,  to  seize  on  Philadelphia.  Washington,  therefore,  placed  a 
strong  force  on  the  Hudson  to  arrest  the  advance  of  Sir  Henry  Clinton,  while 
he  moved  his  main  body  to  Brandywine,  within  ten  miles  of  the  British  post 
at  New  Brunswick.  By  the  middle  of  June,  Howe's  plan  began  to  be  devel- 
oped.    The  main  body  of  his  army  advanced  from  New  York  to  New  Bruns- 

1  During    the     spring  he  had   inoculated  a  large  turned  to  the  subject.     It  was  practised  here  a  year 

portion  of    the  troops  for   the   small-pox.       The  com-  after  the  close  of  the  war. — Lossing's  Hist,  of  the  U. 

mon  practice  of  vaccination  at  the  present  day  was  S„  p.  271. — Is  not  Lossing  in  error  ?     For  a  carefully 

then  unknown  in  the  country.     Indeed  the  attention  of  written  sketch  of  Tenner's  Life  see  Affletoris  Cycl*> 

Tenner,  the  father  cf  the  practice,  had  then  just  been  pedia. 


LAFAYETTE  AT  THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  BRANDYWINE.      369 

wick,  and  by  a  feigned  movement  toward  the  Delaware,  he  tried  to  draw 
Washington  into  an  engagement.  Failing  in  this  attempt,  he  suddenly  re- 
treated, pursued  by  the  whole  American  force  for  some  distance.  A  severe 
skirmish  between  Stirling's  brigade,  and  a  strong  corps  under  Cornwallis, 
took  place  on  the  26th  of  June ;  and  the  Americans  fell  back  without  serious 
loss  to  their  camp.  On  the  30th,  Howe's  army  abandoned  New  Jersey,  and 
crossed  over  to  Staten  Island.  On  the  23d  of  July,  the  commander  sailed 
in  the  fleet  with  eighteen  thousand  troops,  apparently  intending  to  ascend 
the  Delaware  to  capture  Philadelphia.  Washington  pressed  on  at  once  to 
protect  the  national  Capital ;  but  after  a  long  detention  at  sea,  the  squadron 
passed  up  the  Chesapeake,  and  landed  at  the  head  of  the  Bay.  Washington 
advanced  beyond  the  Brandywine  creek,  where  Howe's  superior  force  com- 
pelled him  to  fall  back  to  the  east  side,  as  he  was  not  strong  enough  to 
cope  with  him  without  the  favor  of  more  auspicious  circumstances.  Hard 
pressed,  he  fell  back  to  the  east  of  Brandywine,  where,  at  Chad's  Ford,  he 
made  a  stand,  and  a  fierce  battle  followed.  The  attack  was  begun  on  the 
British  side  by  Knyphausen  on  the  American  left  wing,  which  was  com- 
manded by  Washington  in  person  ;  while  Howe  and  Cornwallis  crossed  the 
stream  several  miles  above,  and  fell  upon  the  American  right  under  the 
command  of  Sullivan.  It  was  a  hotly  contested  field,  and  the  battle  lasted  till 
evening.  The  chief  cause  of  the  disaster,  was  the  conflicting  reports  brought 
in  from  different  directions  by  Washington's  officers.  But  the  approach  of 
Cornwallis  from  an  unexpected  quarter,  with  eight  thousand  men,  embracing 
the  grenadiers  and  the  guards,  turned  the  fortunes  of  the  day,  and  the  routed 
American  army  retreated  on  the  road  to  Chester,  with  a  loss  in  killed, 
wounded,  and  prisoners  of  a  thousand  men. 

Lafayette  at  the  Battle  of  the  Brandywine. — This  was  the  first  battle  in 
which  General  Lafayette  had  been  engaged,  and  throughout  the  day  he  had 
displayed  the  utmost  gallantry,  while  a  surprising  knowledge  of  war  gave 
new  lustre  to  his  military  genius.  In  resisting  the  impetuous  charge  of 
Cornwallis' s  overwhelming  division,  Lafayette  was  struck  from  his  saddle 
by  a  musket-ball  passing  through  his  leg.1  Lafayette  says  :  '  Howe's  army 
was  composed  of  about  twelve  thousand  men  ;  their  losses  had  been  so 

1  'At  that  moment  all  those  remaining  on  the  field  the  generals  and  the  commander-in-chief  arrived,  and 
gave  way.  M.  de  Lafayette  was  indebted  to  Gimat,  he  had  leisure  to  have  his  wound  dressed.' 
his  aide-de-camp,  for  the  happiness  of  getting  upon  his  '  M.  de  Lafayette,  having  been  conveyed  by  water 
horse.  General  Washington  arrived  from  a  distance  to  Philadelphia,  was  carefully  attended  to  by  the  citi- 
with  fresh  troops.  M.  de  Lafayette  was  preparing  to  zens,  who  were  all  interested  in  his  situation  and  ex- 
join  him,  when  loss  of  blood  obliged  him  to  stop  and  treme  youth.  That  same  evening  the  Congress  deter- 
have  his  wound  bandaged  ;  he  was  even  very  near  mined  to  quit  the  city  :  a  vast  number  of  the  inhabi- 
being  taken.  Fugitives,  cannon,  and  baggage  now  tants  deserted  their  own  hearths — whole  families  aban- 
crowded,  without  order,  into  the  road  leading  to  Ches-  doning  their  possessions,  and  uncertain  of  the  future, 
ter.  The  general  employed  the  remaining  daylight  in  took  refuge  in  the  mountains.  M.  de  Lafayette  was 
checking  the  enemy  ;  some  regiments  behaved  extreme-  carried  to  Bristol  in  a  boat ;  he  there  saw  the  fugitive 
ly  well,  but  the  disorder  was  complete.  During  that  Congress,  who  only  assembled  again  on  the  other  side 
time  the  ford  of  Chad  was  forced,  the  cannon  taken,  and  of  the  Susquehanna;  he  was  himself  conducted  to 
the  Chester  road  became  the  common  retreat  of  the  Bethelehem,  a  Moravian  establishment,  where  the  mild 
whole  army.  In  the  midst  of  that  dreadful  confusion,  religion  of  the  brotherhood,  the  community  of  fortune, 
and  during  the  darkness  of  the  night,  it  was  impossible  education,  and  interests,  amongst  that  large  and  simple 
to  recover  ;  but  at  Chester,  twelve  miles  from  the  field  family,  formed  a  striking  contrast  to  scenes  of  blood 
of  battle,  they  met  with  a  bridge  which  it  was  necessary  and  the  convulsions  occasioned  by  a  civil  war.' — Lafay 
to  cross.  M.  de  Lafayette  occupied  himself  in  arresting  ette's  Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  pp.  23-25. 
the  fugitives  ;  some  degree  of  order  was  re-established, 
24 


3  7o  WASHING  TON'S  STRA  TEG  Y  D  URING  1 777. 

considerable  that  their  surgeons  and  those  in  the  country,  were  found  insuffi- 
cient, and  they  requested  the  American  army  to  supply  them  with  some  for 
their  prisoners.  If  the  enemy  had  marched  to  Derby,  the  army  would  have 
been  cut  up  and  destroyed ;  they  lost  an  all-important  night,  and  this  was 
perhaps  their  greatest  fault  during  a  war  in  which  they  committed  so  many 
errors.  It  was  thus  at  twenty-six  miles  from  Philadelphia,  that  the  fate  of 
that  town  was  decided — September  nth,  1777.  The  inhabitants  had  heard 
every  cannon  that  was  fired  there ;  the  two  parties,  assembled  into  distinct 
bands  in  all  the  squares  and  public  places,  had  waited  the  event  in  silence. 
The  courier  at  length  arrived,  and  the  friends  of  liberty  were  thrown  into  con- 
sternation.' ' 

The  Victory  of  the  Brandywine. — It  opened  for  the  conquering  army  the 
road  to  the  Capital.  But  they  were  not  to  enter  it  without  a  further  strug- 
gle. After  giving  several  days'  rest  to  his  troops,  Washington  crossed  the 
Schuylkill  to  meet  Howe,  who  was  advancing  on  Philadelphia.  On  the  16th 
of  September  a  severe  skirmish  took  place  twenty  miles  west  of  the  city ; 
but  a  deluging  rain  prevented  a  general  engagement,  and  the  main  body  of 
the  patriots  withdrew  towards  Reading  for  the  protection  of  their  chief  maga- 
zine of  stores,  while  General  Wayne,  with  fifteen  hundred  men,  hung  on  the 
enemy's  rear  to  harass  his  movements.  A  series  of  fierce  and  bloody  con- 
tests followed  for  the  possession  of  the  line  of  the  Schuylkill  River,  attended 
with  serious  losses  on  both  sides  ;  and  it  being  no  longer  possible,  nor  on  the 
whole  desirable,  to  hold  Philadelphia,  Washington  withdrew  to  his  winter 
quarters  at  Valley  Forge. 

Washington' s  Strategy. — In  no  portion  of  his  life  did  he  display  higher 
military  ability  than  in  the  campaign  of  1777.  To  enable  the  commander 
of  the  Northern  department  to  arrest  the  advance  of  Burgoyne,  and  break 
up  his  plans,  he  had  stripped  himself  of  many  of  his  best  troops ;  and  yet 
with  an  inferior  force,  he  had  detained  Howe  a  whole  month  in  a  march  of  a 
little  more  than  fifty  miles,  till  the  delay  made  it  impossible  for  him  to  obey 
the  instructions  of  the  ministry,  or  mature  any  plan  of  his  own,  in  time  to 
carry  it  into  execution.  Had  he  been  able,  as  he  intended,  to  take  Phila- 
delphia, he  could  have  sent  an  effectual  force  to  relieve  Burgoyne ;  as  it  was, 
he  found  that  another  year  had  been  wasted,  and  he  clearly  foresaw  that  it 
would  cost  him  his  command.  The  final  possession  of  Philadelphia  had  in- 
deed secured  for  himself  and  his  army,  not  only  comfortable  but  luxurious 
quarters.  But  the  success  he  had  gained  in  reaching  that  point  by  the  fiercely 
contested  struggles  at  Germantown,  and  in  taking  Forts  Mifflin  and  Mercer 
on  the  eastern  side  of  the  Delaware,  a  few  miles  below  Philadelphia,  were  a 
poor  compensation  for  the  loss  of  a  whole  season  and  the  British  disasters  at 
the  North.  Those  forts  had  to  be  taken  before  the  English  fleet  could  come 
up  the  Delaware  with  supplies  for  his  relief;  and  before  that  was  accom- 
plished, .his  army  had  begun  to    suffer.     It  had  been  declared  treason  by 

1  Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  p.  24. 


LAFAYETTJJ    AVJ)    WASHINGTON. 


THE  WINTER  AT  VALLEY  FORGE.  371 

the  National  Congress,  either  to  sell  or  to  furnish,  any  provisions  to  the 
enemy,  within  a  distance  of  thirty  miles  from  their  stations.1 

Congress  Abandons  Philadelphia. — When  it  became  evident  that  the  city 
must  fall  into  the  enemy's  hands,  Congress  adjourned — September  27th — first 
to  Lancaster,  and  soon  afterwards  to  York,  carrying  with  them  all  the  public 
archives.  Here  they  felt  secure,  and  the  public  business  was  prosecuted 
without  interruption  till  the  following  summer. 

The  Winter  at  Valley  Forge. — This  spot,  where  Lossing  well  says  that 
patriotism  should  delight  to  pile  its  highest  and  most  venerated  monument,  lies 
in  the  bosom  of  a  rugged  gorge,  on  the  bank  of  the  Schuylkill,  twenty  miles 
north-west  of  Philadelphia.  Gordon,  the  historian,  says  that  while  dining  at 
Washington's  table,  in  1784,  he  told  him  that  bloody  footprints  marked  the 
march  of  his  army  to  the  spot.  It  was  probably  the  coldest  winter  ever 
known  in  America.  Even  the  Bay  of  New  York  was  frozen  so  deep,  that  the 
heaviest  ordnance  was  transported  over  the  ice  from  Staten  Island  to  the 
city,  a  distance  of  seven  miles.  Most  of  the  patriot  army  were  destitute  of 
common  clothing.  Little  provision  could  be  made  even  for  their  shelter  ;  and 
the  great  body  of  them  not  only  stood  barefoot  on  the  frozen  ground  and  ice 
during  the  day,  but  were  compelled  to  sleep  without  blankets  in  the  open  air. 
Disease  struck  the  camp,  and  found  easy  conquests  among  men  who  were 
suffering  such  terrible  privations.  Congress  had  done  the  best  it  could ;  for 
it  had  no  means  of  paying  for  military  stores  or  equipments,  except  by  its  own 
notes  ;  and  when  it  was  found  that  it  could  not  redeem  them,  they  de- 
preciated almost  to  nothing.  Not  an  officer  could  realize  enough  from  his 
pay  to  get  him  the  necessaries  of  life,  and  many  of  the  brave  and  the 
patriotic  were  compelled  to  abandon  their  regiments  to  escape  starvation. 
The  scenes  which  occurred  at  Valley  Forge  during  that  long  and  terrific  winter, 
indicate  the  extremest  suffering.  It  seems  almost  incredible  that  there  could 
have  been  enough  patriotism  in  the  breasts  of  any  body  of  men,  to  stand  by  a 
cause  which  was  so  sorely  and  so  deeply  tried,  although  it  was  sustained  by 
the  great  personal  influence  of  a  commander  so  revered  and  beloved. 

A  Conspiracy  to  supersede  Washington. — It  is  lamentable  and  humiliating ; 
but  during  these  dreadful  months  of  suffering  and  inaction,  a  conspiracy2  was 
plotted  to  remove  Washington   from  the  chief  command  of  the  army.     Gen- 

1  '  There  was  little  disposition,  after  the  news  of  Bur-  *  I  have  no  space  nor  inclination  to  go  into  any  de- 

goyne's  defeat  had  spread  through  the  region,  to  vio-  tailed  account  of  this  disgraceful  cabal.     It  had  its  ori- 

late  this  law  of  Congress,  for  the  hopes  of  the  Tories  gin  in  the  selfish  and  despicable  jealousies  of  Gates,  Lee, 

had  been  considerably  dampened  by  that  event.     Be-  and  Conway,  and  found  a  very  effective   promoter  in 

fore  Howe  got  possession  of  Philadelphia,  he  found  him-  Benjamin  Rush,  whose  great  and  otherwise  unsullied 

self  obliged  to  open  the  navigation  of  the  Delaware,  name  will  forever  be  associated  with  the  dastardly  at- 

which  had  been  obstructed  in  several  places  by  sinking  tempt  to  overthrow  the  man  on  whom  the  hopes  of  the 

heavy-framed  timbers   in   the  river.     The  fierce  and  nation  rested.   Says  Bancroft — vol.  ix.,  p.  461 — "  While 

brave  Count  Donop  assaulted  Fort  Mercer  with  a  body  those  who  wished  the  general  out  of  the  way  urged 

of  sixteen  hundred  Hessians,  where  he  lost  five  hundred  him  to  some  rash  enterprise,  or,  to  feel  the  public  pulse, 

of  his  men,  and  was  fatally  wounded.     Being  taken  to  sent  abroad  rumors  that  he  was  about  to  resign,  Benja- 

the  house  of  a  Quaker  near  by,  he  expired  three  days  min  Rush,  in  a  letter  to  Patrick  Henry,  represented  th« 

afterwards.     His  last  words  were,  '•  I  die  the  victim  of  army  of  Washington  as  having  no  general  at  their  head, 

my  own  ambition,  and  the  avarice  of  my  sovereign."  ' —  and  went  on  to  say  :   '  A  Gates,  a  Lee,  or  a  Coaway 

Lafayette's  Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  p.  31.  would,  in  a  few  weeks,  render  them  an  irresistible  Jodf 


372  A  CONSPIRACY  TO  SUPERSEDE  WASHINGTON. 

eral  Gates  was  to  be  his  successor ;  truth  justifies  the  assertion,  that  he  wa3 
aware  of  all  the  movements  going  on  to  effect  this  object.  His  chief  agent 
was  General  Conway,  who  had  succeeded  in  getting  himself  appointed  inspec- 
tor-general, with  the  rank  of  a  major-general,  his  office  being  made  indepen- 
dent of  the  commander-in-chief.  But  when  the  foul  plot  became  known, 
the  indignation  of  the  army  was  too  great  to  be  disregarded,  and  those  who 
had  been  most  active  in  the  cabal  were  glad  to  escape  from  its  consequences 
as  best  they  could.  The  office  of  inspector-general  was  taken  from  Conway, 
and  the  gallant  Steuben,  a  Prussian  officer  of  great  valor  and  integrity,  was 
appointed  in  his  place.  Conway  was  the  only  member  of  the  cabal  magnani- 
mous enough  to  own  his  error.  In  the  next  July,  after  receiving  a  severe  wound 
in  a  duel,  and  supposing  himself  near  his  end,  he  wrote  the  following  words  to 
Washington  : — '  My  career  will  soon  be  over  ;  therefore  justice  and  truth 
prompt  me  to  declare  my  last  sentiments.  You  are  in  my  eyes  the  great  and 
good  man.  May  you  long  enjoy  the  love,  veneration,  and  esteem  of  these 
States,  whose  liberties  you  have  asserted  by  your  virtues.'  Washington,  who 
was  too  great  to  harbor  resentment,  said,  on  reading  the  letter — '  Poor  Con- 
way never  could  have  intended  much  wrong — there  is  nothing  to  forgive.' 

During  the  intrigues  against  Washington,  Lafayette,  in  a  letter  to  Baron  de 
Steuben,  dated  Albany,  March  12th,  said  :  '  Permit  me  to  express  my  satisfac- 
tion at  your  having  seen  General  Washington.  No  enemies  to  that  great  man 
can  be  found,  except  among  the  enemies  to  his  country ;  nor  is  it  possible 
for  any  man  of  a  noble  spirit,  to  refrain  from  loving  the  excellent  qualities  of 
his  heart.  I  think  I  know  him  as  well  as  any  person,  and  such  is  the  idea 
which  I  have  formed  of  him.  His  honesty,  his  frankness,  his  sensibility,  Ins 
virtue — to  the  full  extent  in  which  this  word  can  be  understood — are  above 
all  praise.  It  is  not  for  me  to  judge  of  his  military  talents  ;  but,  according  to 
my  imperfect  knowledge  of  these  matters,  his  advice  in  council  has  always  ap- 
peared to  me  the  best,  although  his  modesty  sometimes  prevents  him  from 
sustaining  it ;  and  his  predictions  have  generally  been  fullfiled.  I  am  the 
more  happy  in  giving  you  this  opinion  of  my  friend,  with  all  the  sincerity  which  I 
feel,  because  some  persons  may,  perhaps,  attempt  to  deceive  you  on  this  point.' ' 

of  men.  Some  of  the  contents  of  this  letter  ought  to  be  led  me  to  embark  in  the  opposition  to  the  arbitrary 
made  public,  in  order  to  awaken,  enlighten,  and  alarm  claims  of  Great  Britain,  operate  with  additional  force  at 
our  country.'  This  communication,  to  which  Rush  dared  this  day  ;  nor  is  it  my  desire  to  withdraw  my  services 
not  sign  his  name,  Patrick  Henry,  in  his  scorn,  noticed  while  they  are  considered  of  importance  to  the  present 
only  by  sending  it  to  Washington.  An  anonymous  contest.  There  is  not  an  officer  in  the  service  of  the 
paper  of  the  like  stamp,  transmitted  to  the  President  of  United  States  that  would  return  to  the  sweets  of  do- 
Congress,  took  the  same  direction.  mestic  life  with  more  heartfelt  joy  than  I  should,  but  I 

"  Washington's  real  greatness  never  shone  out  more  mean  not  to  shrink  from  the  cause.' 
brilliantly  than  in  the  midst  of  the  villainous  plottings  of  "  In  his  remonstrances  with  Congress  he  wrote  with 

this  low  cabal.      To  William  Gordon,  who  was  then  col-  plainness,  but  with   moderation.       His  calm  dignity, 

lecting  materials  for  his  history  of  the  Revolution,  and  while  it  irritated  his  adversaries,  overawed  them  ;  and 

who  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  Washington,  the  com-  nothing  could  shake  the  confidence  of  the  people,  or 

mander  wrote,  '  Neither  interested  nor  ambitious  views  divide  the  affections  of  any  part  of  the  army,  or  perma- 

led  me  into  the  service.     I  did  not  solicit  the  command,  nently  distract  the  majority  of  Congress.     Those  who 

but  accepted  it  with  much  entreaty,  with  all  that  dif-  had  been  most  ready  to  cavil  at  him,  soon  wished  theit 

fidence  which  a  conscious  want  of  ability  and  experi-  rash     words    benevolently    interpreted     or    forgotten, 

ence  equal  to  the  discharge  of  so  important  a  trust  must  Gates  denied  the  charge  of  being  in  a  league  to  super- 

naturally  excite  in  a  mind  not  quite  devoid  of  thought ;  sede  Washington  as  a  wicked,  false,  diabolical  calumny 

and  after  I  did  engage,  pursued  the  great  line  of  my  of  incendiaries,  and  would  not  believe  that  any  such 

duty,  and  the  object  in  view,  as  far  as  my  judgment  plot    existed  ;     Mifflin    exonerated    himself   in    mon 

could  direct,  as  pointedly  as  the  needle  to  the  pole.    .  equivocal  language  ;  and  both  retired  from  the  com 

No  person  ever  heard  me  drop  an  expression  that  had  mittee  that  was  to  repair  to  head-quarters." 
•  tendency  to  resignation.     The  same  principles  that  x  Lafayette's  Mtmoirs%  p.  163. 


THE  ALLIANCE  WITH  FRANCE.  373 


SECTION  FIFTH. 

ALLIANCE   WITH    FRANCE. 

But  that  dark  winter,  which  had  witnessed  all  the  terrors  that  frost,  pes- 
tilence,  deprivation,  and  treachery  could  accumulate  upon  the  devoted  band 
of  soldiers  at  Valley  Forge  and  their  commander,  was  drawing  to  a  close, 
and  Providence  had  been  smiling  upon  our  cause  in  other  and  distant  scenes. 
Our  privateers  were  sweeping  British  commerce  from  the  sea.  Upwards  of 
five  hundred  English  vessels  had  been  captured  since  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  and  at  last  the  glad  news  came  that  the  king  of  France  had 
become  our  ally,  and  that  the  most  chivalric  of  nations  was  about  to  join  our 
standard.  On  the  seventh  of  May  salutes  were  fired  from  all  the  military 
stations  of  the  United  States,  in  honor  of  Louis  XVI.  and  his  gallant  people. 
This  treaty  of  amity  and  commerce  recognized  our  absolute  independence 
and  sovereignty,  and  stipulated  that  neither  nation  should  make  truce  or  con- 
clude peace  with  England  without  the  consent  of  both ;  and  that  neither  party 
should  cease  hostilities  until  England  acknowledged  the  Independence  of  the 
United  States.  The  American  commissioners  were  then  received  with  all 
the  courtesy  due  to  ambassadors  from  a  friendly  nation.  M.  Gerard  was 
appointed  minister  to  the  United  States,  and  Franklin,  who  remained  in  Paris, 
was,  on  the  ratification  of  the  treaty,  appointed  minister  plenipotentiary  from 
the  now  recognized  Republic  of  the  United  States  of  America. 

Immediate  results  of  the  Alliance. — It  fell  upon  Great  Britain  like  a  bolt 
from  heaven.  It  was  hailed  with  joy  by  the  small  but  powerful  American 
party  in  Parliament  and  throughout  the  nation,  while  it  filled  the  king, 
Lord  North,  and  the  entire  ministry  with  mortification  and  dismay.  A 
profound  feeling  of  alarm  pervaded  the  empire,  which  now  seemed  seriously 
threatened  with  dismemberment.  It  was  no  longer  a  cluster  of  rebel 
colonies,  nor  even  an  insurgent  nation.  The  gaunt  spectre  of  a  new 
Republic  began  to  rise  up  beyond  the  Western  waters,  foreshadowing  the 
dismemberment  of  the  empire,  and  filling  the  loyal  heart' of  the  great  Chatham 
himself  with  terror.  Fired  by  the  patriotism  and  pride  of  Englishmen  from 
the  days  of  Alfred,  this  grandest  of  all  the  champions  of  liberty  and  greatest  of 
all  the  subjects  of  Britain,  could  not  look  with  complaisancy  on  the  separation 
of  his  beloved  thirteen  colonies  from  the  old  empire,  and  therefore  he  arrayed 
himself  against  American  independence.  But  the  clamor  for  reconcilia- 
tion with  America  had  now  become  so  loud,  that  only  a  few  days  after 
the  proclamation  of  the  treaty  with  France,  Lord  North  proposed  a  bill 
for  the  repeal  of  all  Acts  of  Parliament  obnoxious  to  Americans,  that  had  been 
enacted  since  the  close  of  the  French  and  Indian  War ;  and  in  the  speech  he 


374        IMMEDIATE  RESULTS  OF  THE  FRENCH  ALLIANCE. 

made  in  support  of  his  Resolution,  he  proposed  to  recognize  the  legal  ex 
istence  of  the  American  nation,  and  treat  with  the  national  Congress  as  a 
legal  body.     This  astounding  measure  seemed  likely  to  bring  all  the  friends 
of  the  Colonies  to  the  side  of  the  minister.     They  had  desired  to  confer  with 
Franklin — even  to  go  to  Paris   to  see  if  something  could  not  be  done  to 
secure  justice  to  America,  and  wind  up  the  war — even  if  it  were  at  the  expense 
of  recognizing  the  independence  of  the   Republic.     Once  more  poor  Lord 
North  had  a  hard  struggle  between  his  convictions  of  right,  and  his  sense  of 
loyalty  to  his  king.     He  proposed  two  conciliatory  measures,  both  of  which 
passed,  and  received  the  approval  of  the  king  on  the  nth  of  March.     Chat- 
ham would  have  favored  these  bills  ;  but  when  there  seemed  to  be  a  disposi- 
tion to  recognize  American  Independence,  rather  than  waste  further  blood  and 
treasure,  and  involve  the    empire  in  a  war  with  France  and  her  ally  Spain, 
thus  entering  on  a  conflict  which  threatened   to   array  all  Europe  against 
her,  the  courage  and  patriotism  of  the  great  statesman  revolted  against  the 
measure.     The  Duke  of  Richmond,  large  and  liberal  in  his  views,  and  well- 
known  as  an  advocate  of  the  rights  of  the  Colonies,  approached  Lord  Chat- 
ham to  win  his  approval  of  these  bills,  and  urge  for  them  the  sanction  of  the 
House  of  Lords.     But  the  heroic  old  patriot,  unshaken  in  his  purpose  by  the 
appeals  of  life-long  friends  who  had  stood  firmly  around  him    in  his  cham- 
pionship of  liberty  in  other  days,  rejected  the  proposition  with  scorn.     "  On 
the  7th  of  April,  wrapped  up  in  flannel  to  the  knees,  pale  and  wasted  away, 
his  eyes  still  retaining  their  fire,  he  came  into  the  House  of  Lords  leaning  upon 
his  son  William  Pitt,  and  his  son-in-law  Lord  Mahon.     The  peers  stood  up 
out   of  respect  as  he  hobbled  to  his  bench.     The  Duke  of  Richmond  pro- 
posed and  spoke  elaborately  in  favor  of  an  Address  to  the  King,  which  m 
substance  recommended  the  recognition  of  the  independent  sovereignty  of 
the  Thirteen  revolted  Provinces,  and  a  change  of  administration.      Chatham, 
who  alone  of  British  statesmen  had  a  right  to  invite  America  to  resume  her 
old  connection,  rose  from  his  seat  with  slowness  and  difficulty,  leaning  on  his 
crutches,  and  supported  under  each  arm  by  a  friend.     His  figure  was  marked 
with  dignity,  and  he  seemed  a  being  superior  to  all  those  around  him.      Rais- 
ing one  hand  from  his  crutch,  and  casting  his  eyes  towards  heaven,  he  said  :  '  I 
thank  God,  that,  old  and  infirm,  and  with  more  than  one  foot  in  the  grave,  I 
have  been  able  to  come  this  day  to  stand  up  in  the  cause  of  my  country, 
perhaps  never  again-  to  enter  the  walls  of  this   House.'     The  stillness  that 
prevailed  was  most  affecting.     His  voice  at  first  low  and  feeble,  rose  and  be- 
came harmonious ;  but  his  speech  faltered,  his  sentences  were  broken,  his 
words  no  more  than  flashes  in  the  midst  of  darkness,  shreds  of  sublime  but 
unconnected  eloquence.     He  recalled  his  prophecies  of  the  evils  which  were 
to  follow  such  American  measures  as  had  been  adopted,  adding  at  the  end  of 
each,  '  and  so  it  proved.'     He  could  not  act  with  Lord  Rockingham  and  his 
friends,  because  they  persisted  in  unretracted  error.     With  the  loftiest  pride 
he  laughed  to  scorn  the  idea  of  an  invasion  of  England,  by  Spain   or   by 
France,  or  by  both.     '  If  peace  cannot  be  preserved  with  honor,  why  is  not 


SYMPATHY  OF  FREDERIC  OF  PRUSSIA.  375 

war  declared  without  hesitation  ?  This  kingdom  has  still  resources  to  maintain 
its  just  rights.  Any  state  is  better  than  despair.  My  Lords  !  I  rejoice  that  the 
grave  has  not  closed  upon  me ;  that  I  am  still  alive  to  lift  up  my  voice  against 
the  dismemberment  of  this  ancient  and  most  noble  monarchy.'  The  Duke 
of  Richmond  answered  with  respect  for  the  name  of  Chatham,  so  dear  to 
Englishmen  j  but  he  resolutely  maintained  the  wisdom  of  avoiding  a  war  in 
which  France  and  Spain  would  have  America  for  their  ally.  Lord  Chatham 
would  have  replied ;  but  after  two  or  three  unsuccessful  efforts  to  rise,  he  fell 
backwards,  and  seemed  in  the  agonies  of  death.  Every  one  of  the  peers 
pressed  round  him,  save  only  the  Earl  of  Mansfield,  who  sat  unmoved.  The 
senseless  sufferer  was  borne  from  the  House  with  tender  solicitude,  to  the  bed 
from  which  he  never  was  to  rise." ■* 

Sympathy  of  Frederic  of  Prussia. — It  was  certain  now  that  the  National 
Congress  would  no  longer  be  obliged  to  struggle  on  under  the  same  poverty 
and  embarrassments,  since  the  chief  obstacle  to  the  triumph  of  the  American 
arms  was  soon  to  be  removed  by  a  powerful  ally.  The  ministry  knew  that 
the  public  sentiment  of  Europe  was  with  America — that  Frederic  of  Prussia 
held  the  policy  of  the  British  cabinet  and  their  military  management  in  Amei- 
ica  in  utter  contempt — that  he  despised  the  purchase  of  German  troops  for  the 
American  campaign,  and  would  render  no  encouragement  to  so  degrading  a 
policy.  In  the  instructions  which  he  gave  to  his  ambassadors  to  Great  Brit- 
ain and  France,  as  we  now  read  them,  we  discern  a  surprising  foresight  and 
sagacity  of  statesmanship.  During  the  autumn  of  1777,  he  said  to  Goltz, 
his  ambassador  to  Louis  XVI.,  ■  You  can  assure  M.  Maurepas  that  we  have  no 
jealousies  of  the  aggrandizement  of  France  ;  we  even  put  up  prayers  for  her 
prosperity,  so  long  as  her  arms  are  not  found  on  our  borders — that  I  have  no 
connection  whatever  with  England — that  I  begrudge  France  no  advantages 
she  may  gain  by  the  war  in  aid  of  the  American  colonies ;  her  first  interest 
requires  the  enfeeblement  of  Great  Britain,  and  her  shortest  road  to  this  is  to 
strip  her  of  her  colonies  in  America.  The  present  is  the  most  favorable  op- 
portunity that  ever  was  presented,  and  none  more  favorable  will  probably 
occur  for  three  hundred  years.  The  independence  of  the  American  States 
will  be  worth  more  to  France  than  the  war  with  England  will  cost.'  In 
speaking  of  the  overthrow  of  Burgoyne,  in  connection  with  Howe's  successes, 
Frederic  said  :  ■  These  triumphs  of  Howe  are  only  for  a  day.  The  ministry 
could  no  longer  stand  if  the  ancient  spirit  of  English  liberty  had  not  degene- 
rated. They  can  get  money — thirty-six  millions  easier  than  I  can  a  single 
florin  ;  but  where  will  they  get  twenty  thousand  men  ?  Neither  Sweden  nor 
Denmark  will  furnish  them.  Being  at  variance  with  Holland  she  will  get  no 
help  there.  If  she  applies  to  the  small  princes  of  the  German  Empire,  she 
will  find  their  force  already  too  much  absorbed.  England  made  an  awkward 
mistake  n  the  beginning  in  going  to  war  with  her  colonies.  I  agree  with 
Chatham  that  England's  ill  success  is  due  to  the  ignorance,  rashness,  and  in- 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  ix.,  pp.  494,  495. 


376  FRIENDSHIP  OF  THE  QUEEN  OF  FRANCE. 

capacity  of  the  ministry.  The  chief  source  of  the  decay  of  Great  Britain,  can 
be  found  in  the  departure  of  its  present  government  so  radically  from  the 
principles  of  British  history.     All  the  efforts  of  the  king  tend  to  despotism.' 

Frederic's  Prophecy  of  the  Independence  of  the  Colonies. — '  The  reinforce- 
ments which  the  ministry  designs  to  send  to  America,  will  not  change  the  as- 
pect of  affairs,  for  independence  will  always  be  the  indispensable  condition  of 
an  accommodation.  All  good  judges  agree  with  me,  that  if  the  colonies  re- 
main united,  the  mother  country  will  never  subjugate  them.' 

Maurepas  had  asked  Frederic's  opinion  about  the  possible  chances  of  a 
war,  and  which  side  Russia  would  take.  'As  for  Russia,'  said  Frederic, 
1  there  is  no  cause  of  apprehension  of  her  interference ;  the  chances  are,  a 
hundred  to  one,  in  favor  of  the  immense  advantages  France  will  reap  in 
entering  into  the  American  alliance ;  and  the  chances  are  equally  great  that 
the  colonies  will  maintain  their  independence.'  Frederic  was  right  about 
Russia,  for  she  received  the  news  of  the  alliance  of  the  old  Carlovingian 
kingdom  with  the  young  Republic,  with  joy,  and  has  maintained  from  that 
hour  her  friendship  for  the  United  States.  The  warrior-king  nowhere  con- 
cealed his  sympathy  with  the  Americans.  He  tried  to  dissuade  the  German 
princes  from  furnishing  England  with  any  more  troops,  nor  would  he  let  them 
pass  through  his  dominions.  He  had  neither  force  nor  ships  to  defend 
American  cruisers  if  they  should  enter  his  port  of  Embden ;  but  at  Dantzic, 
in  the  Baltic,  he  offered  them  hospitality.  He  extended  to  the  American 
commissioners  every  facility  for  purchasing  arms  and  ships  in  his  kingdom, 
and  in  the  beginning  of  1778,  his  minister  officially  informed  our  commis- 
sioners that  '  the  king  desires  to  see  your  noble  efforts  crowned  with  success, 
and  he  will  not  hesitate  to  recognize  your  independence  when  France,  which 
is  more  directly  interested,  shall  have  given  the  example.'  Although  Lord 
North  could  have  had  no  access  to  such  state  papers,  yet  he  must  have  been 
as  fully  informed  through  his  agents,  of  the  feelings  and  the  policy  of  Prussia 
and  Russia,  as  he  was  of  the  hearty  sympathy  of  the  people  of  Europe  with 
the  fortunes  of  the  American  republic. 

The  Friendship  of  the  Queen  of  France. — Franklin  at  the  Court. — No- 
where did  we  have  a  more  brilliant  or  persuasive  advocate  than  in  Marie 
Antoinette.  This  heroic,  but  most  unfortunate  Princess,  was  known  to  await 
the  reception  of  Franklin  at  the  court  of  France,  with  the  utmost  impa- 
tience, for  she  longed  to  make  some  demonstration  of  sympathy  for  the  cause 
of  republicanism  as  represented  in  his  illustrious  person.  On  the  20th  of 
March,  the  commissioners  were  presented  to  the  king  at  Versailles.  The 
Patriarch  appeared  'dressed  in  the  plain  gala  coat  of  Manchester  velvet 
which  he  had  used  at  the  levee  of  George  III. — the  same  which,  according 
to  the  custom  of  that  age,  he  had  worn — as  it  proved  for  the  last  time  in  Eng 
land  as  agent  for  Massachusetts  when  he  had  appeared  before  the  Privy  Coun 
cil — with  white  stockings,  as  wras  the  use  in  England,  spectacles  on  his  nose 


FRANKLIN  AT  THE  PALACE  AND  THE  ACADEMY.         377 

i  white  hat  under  his  arm,  and  his  thin  gray  hair  in  its  natural  state.'  It  mat- 
tered not  how  his  colleagues  were  dressed ;  the  fact  is  only  noticed  some- 
where, that  all  the  observation  they  attracted  was  owing  to  the  glitter  of 
their  lace,  and  the  quantity  of  their  powder.  Franklin  was  the  observed  of 
all  observers — he  meant  America.  After  the  audience  of  the  king,  the  com- 
missioners paid  a  visit  to  the  young  wife  of  Lafayette,  whose  gallant  husband 
had  already  become  the  idol  of  our  people,  and  was  still  in  that  distant  land 
fighting  our  battles. 

Franklin  at  the  Queen's  Drawing- Room. — Two  days  later  came  the  au- 
dience of  the  queen  in  her  drawing-room,  when,  in  the  presence  of  the  no- 
blest and  most  beautiful  women  of  the  court,  every  possible  demonstration  of 
admiration  and  respect  was  paid  to  the  venerable  American.  The  fash- 
ionable world  went  crazy  over  Franklin.  The  opera  and  theatres  were  crowded 
with  brilliant  audiences,  who  rose  to  receive  him,  and  they  rang  with  the  wild- 
est applause.  No  prince  or  conqueror  ever  swayed  so  magical  a  power 
over  that  gay  and  brilliant  capital.     The  whole  world  did  him  homage. 

Franklin  at  the  Academy. — When  he  was  received  at  the  Academy, 
D'Alembert  the  president,  hailed  him  as  the  being  who  had  '  wrenched  the 
thunderbolt  from  the  heavens,  and  the  sceptre  from  the  tyrants.'  '  How 
grand  a  thought  ! '  exclaimed  Malesherbes,  '  that  they  have  founded  institu- 
tions in  America  which  have  elevated  the  printer-boy  and  the  son  of  a  tallow- 
chandler,  to  mould  their  institutions  and  guide  their  diplomacy.'  There  was 
no  better  judge  in  such  matters  than  John  Adams,  who  said  of  Franklin,  at 
this  time,  *  Not  Leibnitz  or  Newton,  not  Frederic  or  Voltaire,  had  a  more  uni- 
versal reputation ;  and  his  character  was  more  beloved  and  esteemed  than 
that  of  them  all.' 

Franklin  among  the  People. — From  the  throne  to  the  humble  cot  of  the 
peasant ;  from  the  savans  and  the  scholars ;  from  the  statesmen  and  the  en- 
thusiasts for  liberty,  to  the  idlest  'man  of  the  world,'  were  showered 
upon  this  greatest  of  all  living  men,  all  the  honors  which  mankind  can 
bestow  upon  their  benefactors  ;  and  something  far  more  admirable  than  all, 
he  sustained  the  great  weight  with  calmness,  simplicity  and  self-possession. 
His  modesty  disclaimed  any  tributes  of  admiration  of  himself.  He  received 
every  token  of  love  and  adoration,  as  a  tribute  paid  to  his  native  land  now 
passing  through  the  fires  of  a  revolution,  to  establish  freedom  for  all  mankind. 
It  would  seem,  without  exaggeration,  to  have  been  among  the  most  signal 
dispensations  of  a  supreme  Providence,  that  two  such  men  should  have  been 
raised  up  to  be  the  guardians  of  our  fortunes  in  the  two  hemispheres,  as  George 
Washington  and  Benjamin  Franklin. 

After  this,  we  shall  be  greeted  with  more  sunshine  than  cloud  during  the 
revolutionary  struggle.  A  new  strength  will  nerve  the  arm  of  every  patriot 
when  he  is  striking  down  oppression.     New  faith  will  strengthen  the  heart 


37**  THE  FRENCH  FLEET  SAILS  FOR  AMERICA. 

of  the  praying.  Hardships  will  be  borne  with  more  resignation.  'The  bravt 
will  no  longer  fear  the  power  of  man,  nor  the  pious  begin  to  doubt  the  favoi 
of  God.'  The  struggle  indeed  was  not  over.  Days  of  darkness  were  still  to 
come  to  a  bleeding  land,  and  thick  shadows  were  to  fall  over  every  home  in 
America  :  but  through  them  all  the  light  of  the  rising  sun  of  liberty  was  to  send 
its  cheering  beams. 

The  Fre?ich  Fleet  sails  for  America. — France  was  in  earnest.  The  first 
movement  of  her  government  was  to  dispatch  a  squadron  of  twelve  line-of- 
battle  ships,  and  four  heavy  frigates,  under  Count  D'Estaing,  to  blockade  the 
British  fleet  in  the  Delaware.  France  gave  England  notice — March  17th — 
of  her  intention,  thirty  days  before  her  admiral  sailed.  Hereafter  the  de- 
pised  Colonies  could  defy  on  the  ocean  the  mistress  of  the  seas — the  new  title 
England  had  assumed.     * 

How  Lafayette  received  the  Lntelligence. — It  was  with  a  pride  and  satisfac- 
tion that  could  not  be  expressed,  that  young  Lafayette,  who  had  secretly  to  steal 
away  from  his  attempted  arrest  by  the  king,  only  a  short  year  before,  now 
received  this  startling  intelligence  ;  nor  could  anything  have  excited  his  joy  to 
a  higher  ecstasy  than  when  he  saw  that  his  government  had  dated  the  inde- 
pendence of  the  United  States  from  the  hour  it  had  first  been  made,  July  4th, 
1 766.  '  Therein,'  he  exclaimed  to  Washington,  *  lies  the  principle  of  national 
sovereignty,  which  will  one  day  be  recalled  to  them  at  home.' 

The  Salute  from  Valley  Forge. — In  our  younger  days  we  have  talked 
with  men  who  stood  in  the  two  lines  of  our  army  as  drawn  up  on  the  6th  day  of 
May,  1778,  and  the  salute  of  thirteen  cannons  rolled  through  the  rocky  gorge 
of  the  Schuylkill  at  Valley  Forge,  and  who,  with  that  entire  army,  sent  up  their 
long  glad  shouts,  '  Long  live  the  King  of  France — long  live  the  friendly 
powers  of  Europe.' 

The  British  Commissioners  for  Peace. — The  Earl  of  Carlisle,  George  John- 
ston, formerly  Governor  of  Florida,  and  William  Eden,  a  brother  of  Sir  Robert 
Eden,  the  last  royal  Governor  of  Maryland,  were  appointed  as  commissioners 
by  virtue  of  the  two  bills  which  Chatham  had  opposed,  and  King  George  had 
signed  on  the  nth  of  March.  Adam  Ferguson,  the  eminent  Professor  of 
Moral  Philosophy  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh,  was  appointed  secretary  to 
the  commission.  His  name  alone  gave  any  respectability  to  the  sham  em- 
bassy, or  in  the  slightest  measure  relieved  it  from  the  contempt  of  man- 
kind. Copies  of  these  Parliamentary  bills  had  reached  Congress  on  the  15th 
of  April,  and  finding  no  mention  of  independence  as  a  basis  of  negociation, 
they  were  at  first  blush  regarded  as  one  more  miserable  subterfuge  of  the 
managers  of  a  despotic  cause.  On  the  4th  of  June,  when  they  made  known 
their  business,  they  were  informed  that  no  negociations  would  be  entered 
upon  until  Great  Britain  had  withdrawn  her  fleets  and  armies,  and  uncoa- 


BRITISH  COMMISSIONERS  FOR  PEACE.  379 

ditionally  recognized  the  independence  of  the  United  States.  But  pending 
these  attempts  at  negociation,  the  commissioners  did  their  utmost  to  seduce 
every  man  of  any  importance  whom,  by  secret  and  subtle  means,  they  could 
succeed  in  reaching.  In  one  interview  with  General  Joseph  Reed,  a  delegate 
from  Pennsylvania,  Johnston  offered  him  ten  thousand  pounds  sterling  and 
the  best  office  in  the  king's  gift  in  the  Colonies,  if  he  would  abandon  their 
cause.  Reed's  patriotism  had  been  suspected,  and  the  intrigue  had  been 
carried  on  through  a  female  relative.  So  much  was  alleged  and  believed  at 
the  time.  The  secret  was  badly  kept,  and  it  became  necessary  for  General 
Reed  to  denounce  the  entire  rumor  as  a  libel ;  he  is  reported  to  have  said, 
*  I  am  not  worth  purchasing,  but  such  as  I  am,  the  King  of  England  is  not 
rich  enough  to  buy  me.'  In  fact,  it  is  believed  that  Johnston  succeeded  in 
buying  nobody  that  was  worth  the  money.  It  was  believed  that  purchases 
of  this  stamp  were  the  chief  objects  of  the  Commissioners.  They  wrote  letters 
where  they  could  not  deal  in  person,  or  find  instruments.  They  were,  how- 
ever, closely  watched,  and  their  intrigues  exposed,  when  Congress  refused 
indignantly  any  longer  to  recognize  them,  and  they  were  allowed  to  return 
from  their  disreputable  and  ridiculous  mission.  They  might  have  been  saved 
the  trouble  of  coming  at  all,  for  they  were  not  ignorant  of  Franklin's 
peremptory  assurances  that  '  it  would  be  all  in  vain  to  attempt  to  treat  with 
the  United  States  on  any  other  basis  than  the  recognition  of  their  inde- 
pendence.' Jackson,  who  had  been  the  former  colleague  of  Franklin,  and 
secretary  of  Granville,  refused  to  serve  on  this  so-called  '  commission  for 
peace,'  because  it  was  evident  enough  to  him  that  it  was  '  a  delusion  accorded 
by  the  king  to  quiet  Lord  North,  and  to  unite  the  nation  against  the  Ameri- 
cans.' 

The  Failure  of  the  Commission  a  foregone  Conclusion  in  America. — Before 
they  arrived  Washington  wrote  to  a  member  of  Congress,  April  21,  1778: 
1  Nothing  short  of  independence  can  possibly  do.  A  peace  on  any  other 
terms  would  be  a  peace  of  war.  The  injuries  we  have  received  from  the 
British  nation  were  so  unprovoked,  and  have  been  so  many,  that  they  can 
never  be  forgotten.  Our  fidelity  as  a  people,  our  character  as  men,  are 
opposed  to  a  coalition  with  them  as  subjects.'  The  day  following  having 
been  appointed  for  ■  a  public  fast  and  humiliation,  with  prayer  to  Almighty 
God  to  strengthen  and  perpetuate  the  union,'  in  their  house  of  worship 
where  Congress  had  assembled  in  a  body,  they  'resolved  to  hold  no  conference, 
or  treat  with  any  commissioners  on  the  part  of  Great  Britain,  unless  they 
should,  as  a  preliminary  thereto,  either  withdraw  their  fleets  and  armies,  or, 
in  positive  and  express  terms,  acknowledge  the  independence  of  the  States."  ' 

Franklin  and  Voltaire. — While  D'Estaing's  fleet,  which  had  sailed  from 

1  This  was  everywhere  the  public  feeling.  John  Jay  ceuvre  : '  and  the  lion-hearted   Robert  Morris  wrote, 

said  he  had  not  met  a  single  American  willing  to  accept  '  No  offers  ought  to  have  a  hearing  of  one  moment,  un- 

peace  under  Lord  North's  terms.  George  Clinton,  then  less  preceded  by  acknowledgment  of  our  independ- 

Governor  of  New  York,  and  afterwards — 1804-1811 —  ence,  because  we  can  never  be  a  happy  people  undet 

Vice-President  of    the  United    States,   said  :     '  Lord  their  domination.     Great  Britain  would  still  enjoy  th« 

North  is   two  years   too   late  with   his  political  man-  greatest  share  and  most  valued  parts  of  our  trade.' 


380  MEETING  OF  FRANKLIN  AND  VOLTAIRE. 

Toulon  on  the  ioth  of  April,  was  passing  out  of  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar,  a 
scene  was  being  witnessed  in  Paris,  the  like  of  which  never  could  have  oc- 
curred in  any  other  nation  or  period.  The  illustrious  philosopher  Voltaire, 
who  had  done  more  to  sanctify  the  principle  of  toleration  than  any  other  man 
who  had  ever  lived,  who  had  no  rival  in  fame  as  a  man  of  letters,  and  who 
represented  in  his  own  person  the  France  of  his  time,  more  than  her  king,  or 
all  her  statesmen  or  priests,  had  come  up  to  Paris  for  his  last  visit,  to  receive 
such  honors  as  she  had  never  bestowed  before  upon  any  one  of  her  children. 
No  two  men  who  had  never  met,  knew  each  other  better  than  Voltaire  and 
Franklin.  Soon  after  his  arrival  in  the  capital,  the  American  Ambassador, 
with  the  veneration  which  scholars  alone  feel  for  learning  and  its  masters, 
waited  upon  the  octogenarian.  Voltaire  himself,  in  his  touching  description 
of  the  interview,  tells  us  that  before  they  parted,  Franklin,  who  had  brought 
his  grandson  along  with  him,  led  him  up  to  Voltaire  to  ask  for  his  benedic- 
tion. In  the  presence  of  the  little  assembly  of  twenty  persons,  all  of  whom 
were  deeply  impressed  with  the  cheerful  solemnity  of  the  scene,  the  old  man 
laid  his  hand  upon  the  boy's  head,  and  lifting  his  eyes  upward  gave  his  bless- 
ing in  the  sublime  words,  ■  God  and  liberty.'  Even  the  devoutest  Christian 
could  add  but  one  other  name,  so  sacred.  Voltaire  loved  Franklin,  and  the 
cause  of  America  lay  very  near  his  heart.  He  was  proud  wherever  he  went 
to  have  it  known  that  his  admiration  and  love  for  the  new  Republic  was  the 
strongest  passion  of  his  last  days. 

A  few  days  later,  a  far  more  imposing  spectacle  was  presented  at  the 
French  Academy,  whose  members  had  assembled  for  the  solemn  reception 
of  the  French  philosopher.  John  Adams,  who  had  been  appointed  to  super- 
sede Silas  Deane  in  the  American  embassy,  and  who  had  just  reached  Paris, 
attended  Franklin  on  this  great  occasion. 

When  these  two,  by  universal  consent  the  greatest  chieftains  of  intellect 
living,  thus  publicly  met  in  genial  friendship,  the  enthusiasm  of  the  immense 
audience  transcended  all  bounds.  But  it  was  not  enough  that  the  two  men 
should  greet  each  other  so  heartily;  the  assembly  was  not  satisfied;  they 
demanded  some  more  earnest  token  of  complete  affiliation.  ■  Embrace/ 
they  screamed  ;  and  in  the  presence  of  all  that  was  most  distinguished  in 
letters  and  philosophy,  Franklin  and  Voltaire  embraced  and  kissed  each 
other.  The  two  wept  and  were  glad  together.  Such  was  the  garland  with 
which  the  Night  of  the  Old  World,  with  the  Morning  of  the  New,  crowned  the 
Young  Republic  in  its  cradle.  Hereafter,  the  latest  born  free  commonwealth 
became  the  adopted  child  of  the  oldest  and  most  brilliant  monarchy  in 
Europe.  From  that  hour  P'rance  herself  was  to  come  forth  from  the  shadows 
of  the  past — however  radiant  with  the  glories  of  the  achievements  of  seventeen 
centuries — and  enter  upon  a  new  and  more  magnificent  career. 

Voltaire's  true  Place  in  Philosophical  History. — A  few  Words  here. — Vol- 
taire was  well  enough  understood  in  his  own  time — he  was  only  misinterpreted 
afterwards ;  and  even  now  the  mists  of  vulgar  ignorance  too  much  cloud 
his  name.     But  he  is  beginning,  after  ne  has  been  nearly  a  century  in  his 


VOLTAIRE'S  PLACE  IN  PHILOSOPHICAL  HISTORY.  381 

tomb,  to  reap  the  only  reward  such  a  man  cares  for — to  be  co?nprehe?ided. 
When  he  came  into  life  he  found  himself  almost  the  only  living  thing  in 
the  midst  of  dead  Europe.  The  old  alliance  of  priest  and  king — which 
had  carried  on  the  business  of  mankind  through  all  the  historic  ages — was 
still  a  firm  and  unbroken  partnership.  He  who  was  to  put  an  end  to  this 
alliance,  and  as  the  great  apostle  of  absolute  liberty  to  think,  and  become 
the  father  of  modern  thought,  as  well  as  its  vindicator,  found  the  men  of  hi  3 
times  believing  everything  and  knowing  nothing.  His  illuminated  soul  de 
clared  war  d  Poutrance,  against  this  system  of  mental  despotism.  He  had 
some  foundation  for  his  boast,  that  he  had  done  more  for  the  political  re- 
demption of  men  from  tyranny,  and  the  human  soul  from  superstition,  than 
Calvin  and  Luther.  In  one  sense  he  had,  and  in  a  very  broad  sense  ;  and 
yet  it  is  just  as  true  to  say  that,  but  for  those  men,  Voltaire  would  never  have 
been  heard  of;  he  was  himself  the  child  of  the  Protestant  Reformation,  and 
by  direct  and  unquestionable  lineage ;  he  had  a  great  mission,  and  he  fulfilled 
it  well.  That  mission  was  to  tear  down  the  past — not  to  build  up  the 
future. 

An  age  of  supreme  credulity  must  needs  be  followed  by  an  age  of  supreme 
skepticism.  A  generation  of  idol  worshippers  must  be  followed  by  a  genera- 
tion of  iconoclasts.  France  had  committed  her  faith  to  the  priests  ;  their  false- 
ness to  the  trust,  led  to  the  giving  up  of  all  faith.  Thinking  men  then  made  an 
age  of  reason,  and  this  reason  could  be  inaugurated  on  the  old  throne,  only 
when  the  false  and  rotten  superstructure  had  been  swept  away.  When  men 
find  out  that  they  have  been  often  deceived,  they  must  doubt  before  they  can 
rationally  believe.  Wounded  faith  is  the  only  true  pupil — it  alone  is  capable 
of  scrutiny  worthy  of  the  name  of  investigation  ;  and  such  investigation  is 
the  only  road  to  truth.  Credulity  is  the  arch-enemy  of  truth.  Reason  is  its 
only  handmaid.  Facts  are  its  only  instruments.  When  a  man  has  believed 
too  much,  it  is  time  for  him  to  begin  to  doubt.  Buckle,  in  the  opening  of 
his  History  of  Civilization  in  Great  Britain,  starts  out  on  a  basis  already  pre- 
pared for  him  by  Descartes,  Bossuet,  Edwards,  Reid,  Kant,  Rousseau,  and 
Voltaire — that  skepticism  is  the  first  starting-point  on  the  road  to  a  knowledge 
of  scientific  truth,  and  that  reason  is  the  only  guide. 

It  was  not  given  to  Voltaire  to  be  a  builder,  he  was  a  pioneer,  levelling 
forests  and  mountains,  and  filling  up  valleys  to  open  a  clear  way  to  the 
temple  of  truth.  He  was  not  a  Bacon  to  lead  the  human  race  by  the  sub- 
lime laws  of  reason  into  the  treasure-house  where  nature  holds  all  truth  ;  but 
in  one  respect  he  was  greater  than  all  these  fathers  of  modern  light.  In  his 
heart  of  hearts  he  abhorred  all  superstition— he  hated  all  tyranny  over  the  mind 
— time  itself  could  give  no  sanction  to  oppression.  Feudalism  in  the  intellect 
was  a  far  mightier  wrong  than  feudalism  in  the  soil,  or  in  the  muscles  of  men. 
Kings  did  not  reign  by  a  divine  right — all  the  divinity  of  right  inhered  in  the 
individual  soul.  He  therefore  accorded  to  the  rising  Republic  of  America  a 
more  earnest  and  philosophical  greeting,  than  any  European  of  his  times. 
Standing  on  the  mount  of  vision,  which  became  to  him  a  mount  also  of  trans- 


382  FETE  IN  HONOR  OF  LORD  HOWE. 

figuration,  where  the  fathers  of  the  American  Republic  stood  on  the  4th  of 
July,  '76,  he  caught  the  first  full-orbed  view  of  the  Promised  Land  for  the 
human  race.  Among  the  utterances  of  his  last  days,  no  one  was  repeated 
oftener,  or  with  deeper  unction,  than  this  :  ■  I  have  lived  to  see  the  birth  of  a 
new  Republic,  based  upon  principles  which  will  secure  the  political  emanci- 
pation of  the  world,  and,  therefore,  I  have  not  lived  in  vain.  All  thanks  to 
God.'  It  was  not  the  God  of  any  hierarchy,  but  in  the  fine  language  of  Sprague, 
*  the  God  of  the  universe  whom  he  recognized  in  everything  around  him  : '  for 
he  who  had  been  so  often  denounced  as  a  scoffer  at  truth,  was  in  the  depths 
of  his  large  soul  one  of  its  most  reverent  worshippers. 

Lord  Howe  superseded  by  Sir  Henry  Clinton. — It  was  evident  that  Lord 
Howe  '  would  not  do '  any  longer,  and  Sir  Henry  Clinton  was  appointed  in 
his  place.  On  the  18th  of  May,  1778,  the  officers  of  the  British  army  got  up, 
in  honor  of  their  retiring  commander-in-chief,  the  most  brilliant  fete  that  had 
ever  been  seen  in  America.  It  was  graced  by  the  most  beautiful  women 
among  the  Tory  families  in  Philadelphia,  by  the  wives  and  female  relatives  of 
the  British  officers,  and  crowned  with  the  charms,  such  as  they  were,  of  the 
favorite  mistresses  of  Lord  Howe  and  his  staff.  The  loose  discipline  of  the 
army  during  these  six  months  of  idleness  did  more  to  weaken  the  power  of 
the  enemy,  than  all  the  battles  they  had  yet  fought,  which  fully  justifies  the 
remark  of  Franklin,  that  '  General  Howe  has  not  taken  Philadelphia, — Phila- 
delphia has  taken  General  Howe.' 

The  Fete  in  Honor  of  the  Retiring  Comtnander. — The  sedateness  of  '  our 
national  historian '  has  not  disdained  some  account  of  this  gorgeous  festival : 
'  The  numerous  company  embarked  on  the  Delaware,  above  the  town,  and, 
to  the  music  of  one  hundred  and  eight  hautboys,  rowed  two  miles  down  the 
stream  in  galleys  and  boats,  glittering  with  colors  and  streamers.  They  passed 
two  hundred  transport  vessels  tricked  out  in  bravery,  and  crowded  with  look- 
ers-on ;  and  landing  to  the  tune,  God  save  the  King,  under  salutes  from  the 
decorated  ships  of  war,  they  marched  between  lines  of  cavalry  and  infantry 
and  all  the  standards  of  the  army  to  a  lawn,  where,  in  presence  of  their  chosen 
ladies,  raised  on  thrones,  officers,  fantastically  dressed  as  knights  and  squires, 
engaged  in  a  tournament.  After  this  they  proceeded,  under  an  ornamented 
arch,  to  a  splendidly  furnished  house,  where  dancing  began  ;  and  a  gaming- 
table was  opened  with  a  bank  of  two  thousand  guineas.  The  tickets  of  admis- 
sion described  the  guest  of  the  night  as  the  setting  sun,  bright  at  its  going 
down,  but  destined  to  rise  in  greater  glory ;  and  fireworks,  in  dazzling  letters, 
promised  him  immortal  laurels.  At  midnight  a  supper  of  four  hundred  and 
thirty  covers  was  served,  under  the  light  of  twelve  hundred  wax  candles,  and 
was  enlivened  by  an  orchestra  of  more  than  one  hundred  instruments.  Dancing 
continued  until  the  sun  was  more  than  an  hour  high.  Never  had  subordi- 
nates given  a  more  brilliant  farewell  to  a  departing  general ;  and  it  was 
doubly  dear  to  the  commander,  for  it  expressed  their  belief  that  the  minis- 


HO  WETS  LAST  AMERICAN  A  CHIE VEMENT.  383 

try  had  wronged  him,  and  that  his  own  virtue  pointed  him  out  for  advance- 
ment.' ■ 

This  brilliant  farce  well  terminated  the  tragedy  which  Lord  Howe  had  been 
playing  in  the  slaughter  and  attempted  ruin  of  a  whole  people.  It  was 
all  proper  enough  as  an  interlude  between  the  two  chief  parts  of  the  bloody 
drama.  The  uncle  was  to  disappear,  but  his  nephew,  the  King,  was  to  keep 
the  stage  four  years  longer. 

Howe's  last  American  Achievement. — Lord  Howe  was  unlucky  in  the 
American  fetes  in  honor  of  his  military  achievements.  Hardly  had  the  music 
of  his  last  night's  revels  died  away,  before  he  received  news  that  a  detach- 
ment of  two  thousand  five  hundred  men,  with  field-batteries  of  eight  cannon, 
had  crossed  the  Schuylkill  under  Lafayette,  and  taken  a  strong  position  twelve 
miles  from  Valley  Forge.  Greeting  the  chance  which  fortune  seemed  to  hold 
out  to  him  for  gracing  his  departure  from  the  continent  with  a  brilliant  feat 
of  arms,  his  now  disrobed  knights,  who  were  resting  from  the  fatigues  of 
the  tournament,  and  sleeping  off  the  fumes  of  protracted  revels,  were  sum- 
moned by  a  sudden  call  to  the  saddle.  With  five  thousand  picked  men,  and 
expert  guides,  Grant  was  dispatched  by  a  circuitous  route  to  strike  the  rear 
of  '  the  beardless  Frenchman,'  and  by  daylight  the  next  morning  Lord  Howe 
was  on  the  march  at  the  head  of  a  corps  of  six  thousand  of  the  best  troops 
in  his  army,  in  two  divisions  under  Clinton  and  Knyphausen,  his  two  most  ac- 
complished commanders.  But  Lafayette  was  not  to  be  taken  as  a  trophy  in 
the  same  ship  which  was  waiting  to  carry  Lord  Howe  to  England.  Lafayette's 
direct  communication  with  Washington's  camp  had  indeed  been  cut  off,  but 
his  vigilance  and  adroitness  had  fully  made  up  for  the  strategy  on  which  the 
British  commander  depended.  The  appearance  of  a  few  small  parties  in  the 
woods,  intended  to  indicate  the  heads  of  the  main  columns,  was  a  successful  ruse, 
for  it  arrested  Howe's  force  long  enough  in  forming  for  battle,  for  Lafayette 
to  escape  with  his  main  body  over  another  ford  which  had  been  left  entirely 
unprotected.  The  crestfallen  British  leader,  out-generalled  by  a  boy,  marched 
with  his  wayworn  army  back  to  the  scene  of  his  late  brilliant  tournament,  and 
four  days  later  he  passed  his  command  over  to  Sir  Henry  Clinton,  a  better 
soldier,  but  not  a  braver  man,  and  sailed  home  to  his  '  Merrie  England.' 

Why  Burgoyne's  Army  was  not  allowed  to  sail  for  England. — Magnani- 
mous as  were  the  terms  of  surrender  which  Gates  had  granted  at  Saratoga  to  the 
army  of  Burgoyne,  those  terms  had  been  violated  at  the  time,  by  ■  the  conceal- 
ment of  the  public  chest,  and  other  public  properties  of  which  the  United 
States  were  thus  defrauded.'  This  violation  of  the  convention  had  also  been 
followed  by  Burgoyne's  unfounded,  and  insulting  accusation  against  the  good 
faith  of  the  country,  which  intimated  that  neither  he,  his  army,  nor  his  nation 
were  bound  by  any  of  the  conditions  of  the  convention.     The  embarkation 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  x.,  pp.  1 18-19.  An  elaborate  and  Annual  Register,  a  London  Magazine  for  the  year 
rxquisitely  artistic  account  of  this  Jete,  written  by  the  1778.  For  this  or  almost  any  other  rare  work,  con*'Ut 
graceful  pen  of  Major  Andre,  was  published  in  The    the  Astor  Library. 


384         HOW  OUR  PRISONERS  OF  WAR  WERE  TREATED. 

of  the  prisoners  was  therefore  suspended  by  an  Act  of  Congress,  until  the  British 
government  should  redeem  the  pledges  of  its  captive  general.  The  so-called 
'commissioners  for  peace'  desired  to  negotiate  for  the  release  of  Burgoyne's 
army.  But  as  they  were  clothed  with  no  such  authority,  and  by  the4r  shame- 
less and  perfidious  attempts  at  bribing  our  citizens  had  forfeits  d  all  claims  to 
confidence  or  even  hospitality,  the  prisoners  were  justly  detained. 

How  our  Prisoners  of  War  were  treated. — This  dark  page  must  be  opened 
for  the  present  and  future  times  to  read,  that  men  may  learn  into  what 
brutal  inhumanity  tyranny  betrays  the  instruments  of  its  injustice.  But 
the  loathsome  record  shall  be  brief.  Neither  the  accuracy  nor  justice  of 
Lafayette  will  be  called  in  question.     He  knew  whereof  he  spoke  : 

"  An  exchange  of  prisoners  had  long  been  talked  of,  and  the  cruelty  of 
the  English  rendered  this  measure  the  more  necessary.  Cooped  up  in  a 
vessel  at  New  York,  and  breathing  a  most  noxious  atmosphere,  the  American 
prisoners  suffered  all  that  grose  insolence  could  add  to  famine,  dirt,  disease, 
and  complete  neglect.  Their  food  was,  to  say  the  least,  unwholesome.  The 
officers,  often  confounded  with  their  soldiers,  appealed  to  former  capitulations 
and  to  the  rights  of  nations,  but  they  were  only  answered  by  fresh  outrages. 
When  one  victim  sunk  beneath  such  treatment,  '  'Tis  well,'  was  said  to  the 
survivors  ;  '  there  is  one  rebel  less.'  Acts  of  retaliation  had  been  but  rarely 
practised  by  the  Americans  ;  and  the  English,  like  other  tyrants,  mistook 
their  mildness  and  generosity  for  timidity.  Five  hundred  Americans,  in  a 
half-dying  state,  had  been  carried  to  the  sea-shore,  where  the  greatest  number 
of  them  soon  expired,  and  the  general  very  properly  refused  to  reckon  them 
in  exchange  for  his  own  prisoners  of  war."  x 

British  Prisons  and  Prison  Ships. — Although  the  horrible  tale  of  the  bar- 
barities inflicted  upon  American  prisoners  has  been  told  a  thousand  times,  yet 
it  should  always  be  repeated  in  any  record  of  the  Revolution,  for  nothing  else 
can  ever  illustrate  so  well,  the  spirit  of  inhumanity  with  which  England  carried 
on  the  war.  Its  baseness  and  brutality  found  no  justification  in  the  acts  of 
our  government,  nor  in  the  conduct  of  our  people.  I  quote,8  in  an  extended 
note,  Dr.  Lossing's  account  of  the  British  Prisons  and  Prison  Ships. 

1  Lafayette's  Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  pp.  48-49.  bably  more  than  a  thousand  private  citizens,   arrested 

2  Associations  of  intense  horror  are  linked  with  the  by  the  British  on  suspicion  or  positive  proof  of  their 
memory  and  the  records  of  the  cruelties  practised,  and  being  active  Whigs,  were  also  made  prisoners,  and  at 
sufferings  endured  in  the  prisons  and  prison-ships  the  close  of  the  year,  at  least  five  thousand  American 
at  New  York,  in  which  thousands  of  captive  patriots  captives  were  in  the  power  of  the  invaders.  The  only 
were  from  time  to  time  incarcerated  during  the  war  for  prisons  proper  in  the  city  were  the  l  New  Jail '  and  the 
Independence.  Those  who  were  made  prisoners  on  '  New  Bridewell.'  The  former,  entirely  altered  in  ap- 
land  were  confined  in  the  foul  jails  of  the  city,  while  pearance,  is  the  present  Hall  of  Records  in  the  Park, 
captive  seamen,  and  sometimes  soldiers  too,  were  kept  east  of  the  City  Hall,  the  latter  stood  between  the  pres- 
for  months  in  floating  dungeons,  ent  City  Hall  and  Broadway.  These  were  quite  in- 
sufficient, and  the  three  spagious  sugar-houses  then  in 

'  doomed  to  famine,  shackles,  and  despair,  the  city,   some  of  the  Dissenting  churches,  Columbia 

Condemned  to  breathe  a  foul,  infected  air  College,  and  the  Hospital,   were  all  used  as  prisons. 

In  sickly  hulks,  denoted  while  they  lay  The  disastrous  effects  of  the  great  fire  in  September, 

Successive  funerals  gloomed  each  dismal  day.'  the  demands  of  the  British  army  for  supplies,  the  indo- 

Philip  Fkeneau.  lent  indifference  of  Sir  William  Howe,   and  the  cruel 

conduct  of  Cunningham,  the  provost  marshal,  combined 

We  before  observed  that  the  prisoners  taken  in  the  to  produce  intense  suffering  among  the  prisoners. 

battle  near  Brooklyn  in  August,  and  near  Fort  Wash-  Van  Courtland's  sugar-house,  which    stood  at  the 

ington  in  November,  1776,  almost  four  thousand  in  all,  northwest    corner  of  Trinity  church-yard,  corner  of 

were  confined  in  prisons  in  the  City  of  New  York.    Pro-  Thames   and  Lumber  streets  ;    Rheinlander's,  on  the 


LAFAYETTE  VISITS  HIS  HOME. 


385 


Lafayette  makes  a  Visit  to  his  Home.— He  thus  speaks  of  it  in  his  Memoirs : 
*  After  having  spent  some  days  together,  and  spoken  of  their  past  labor,  pres- 
ent situations,  and  future  projects,  General  Washington  and  he  took  a  tender 
and  painful  leave  of  each  other.  At  the  same  time  that  the  enemies  of  this 
great  man  have  accused  him  of  insensibility,  they  have  acknowledged  his  ten- 
derness for  M.  de  Lafayette  \  and  how  is  it  possible  that  he  should  not  have 
been  warmly  cherished  by  his  disciple,  he  who  uniting  all   that  is  good  to  all 


corner  of  William  and  Duane  :  and  the  more  eminently 
historical  one  on  Liberty  street  (Nos.  34  and  36),  a  few 
feet  eastward  of  the  Middle  Dutch  Church,  now  the 
Post-Office,  were  the  most  spacious  buildings  in  the 
city,  and  answered  the  purposes  of  prisons  very  well. 
The  North  Dutch  Church,  yet  standing  on  William 
street,  between  Fulton  and  Ann,  was  made  to  contain 
eight  hundred  prisoners,  after  taking  out  the  pews  and 
using  them  for  fuel,  and  placing  a  floor  across  from 
gallery  to  gallery.  For  about  two  months  several  hun- 
dred prisoners  were  huddled  together  in  the  Middle 
Dutch  Church,  when  they  were  removed,  and  it  was 
converted  into  a  riding-school  after  taking  out  the  pews. 
The  '  Brick  Church  '  in  the  triangle  between  Park  Row 
and  Beekman  and  Nassau  streets,  was  used  for  a  pri- 
son a  short  time,  when  it,  and  the  Presbyterian  church 
in  Wall  street,  the  Scotch  Church  in  Cedar  street,  and 
the  Friends'  Meeting-house  in  Liberty  street,  were  con- 
verted into  hospitals.  The  French  Church  in  Pine 
street  and  a  portion  of  Van  Courtland's  sugar-house, 
were  used  as  magazines  for  ordnance  and  stores,  and 
the  old  City  Hall  was  converted  into  a  guard-house  for 
the  main  guard  of  the  city.  The  latter  had  dungeons 
beneath  it,  wherein  civil  officers,  and  afterward  whale- 
boatmen  and  land  marauders  were  confined. 

The  '  New  Jail '  was  made  a  provost  prison,  where 
American  officers  and  the  most  eminent  Whigs  who 
fell  into  the  hands  of  the  British  were  confined.  Here 
was  the  theatre  of  Cunningham's  brutal  conduct  to- 
wards the  victims  of  his  spite.  The  prisoners  were  for- 
mally introduced  to  him,  and  their  name,  age,  size,  and 
rank  were  recorded.  They  were  then  confined  in  the 
gloomy  cells,  or  to  the  equally  loathsome  upper 
chamber,  where  the  highest  officials  in  captivity  were  so 
closely  crowded  together,  that  when,  at  night,  they  laid 
down  to  sleep  upon  the  hard  plank  floor,  they  could 
change  position  only  by  all  turning  over  at  once,  at  the 
words  right — left.  Their  food  was  scanty  and  of  the 
poorest  kind,  often  that  which  Cunningham  had  ex- 
changed at  a  profit  for  better  food  received  from  their 
friends,  or  from  the  commissariat.  Little  delicacies, 
brought  by  friends  of  the  captives,  seldom  reached  them, 
and  the  brutal  Cunningham  would  sometimes  devour  or 
destroy  such  offerings  of  affection,  in  the  presence  of 
his  victims,  to  gratify  his  cruel  propensities.  Thus,  for 
many  months,  gentlemen  of  fortune  and  education,  who 
had  lived  in  the  enjoyment  of  the  luxuries  and  refined 
pleasures  of  elegant  social  life,  were  doomed  to  a  miser- 
able existence,  embittered  by  the  coarse  insults  of  an 
ignorant,  drunken  Irish  master,  or  to  a  speedy  death 
caused  by  such  treatment,  the  want  of  good  food,  and 
fresh  air,  and  innumerable  other  sufferings,  the  result,  in 
a  great  measure,  of  the  criminal  indifference  (it  may  be 
commands)  of  Loring,  Sprout,  and  Lennox,  commis- 
saries of  prisoners  at  various  times.  Still  greater  cruelties 
were  practised  upon  the  less  conspicuous  prisoners,  and 
many  were  hanged  in  the  gloom  of  night,  without  trial 
or  known  cause  for  the  foul  murder. 

The  heart  sickens  at  the  recital  of  the  sufferings  of 
these  patriots,  and  we  turn  in  disgust  from  the  view 
which  the  pen  of  faithful  history  reveals.  Let  us  draw 
before  it  the  veil  of  forgetfujness,  and,  while  contemplat- 
ing the  cruelties  and  woes  of  that  hour  of  the  past, 
listen  to  the  suggestions  of  Christian  charity,  which  ob- 
serves that  much  of  the  general  suffering  was  the  result 
of  stern  necessity,  and  that  the  cry  of  individual  wrongs 
inflicted  by  Cunningham  and  his  hirelings,  did  not  often 
reach  the  ears  of  the  more  humane  officers  of  the  British 
army. 

Next  to  the  provost  prison  the  sugar-house  in  Lib- 
erty street  was  most  noted  for  the  sufferings  of  cap- 
tive patriots.  It  was  a  dark  stone  building,  five  stories 
in  height,  with    small,  deep  windows  like  port-holes, 

25 


giving  it  the  appearance  of  a  prison.  Each  story  was 
divided  into  two  apartments.  A  large,  barred  door 
opened  upon  Liberty  street,  and  from  another  on  the 
southeast  side  a  stairway  led  to  the  gloomy  cellars 
which  were  used  as  dungeons.  Around  the  whole 
building  was  a  passage  a  few  feet  wide,  and  there,  day 
and  night,  British  and  Hessian  sentinels  patrolled.  The 
whole  was  enclosed  by  a  wooden  fence  nine  feet  in 
height.  Within  this  gloomy  jail  the  healthy  and  the 
sick,  white  and  black,  were  indiscriminately  thrust : 
and  there,  during  the  summer  of  1777.  many  died  from 
want  of  exercise,  cleanliness,  and  fresh  air.  '  In  the 
suffocating  heat  of  summer,'  says  Dunlap,  '  I  saw  every 
aperture  of  these  strong  walls  filled  with  human  heads, 
face  above  face,  seeking  a  portion  of  the  external  air.' 
At  length  in  July,  1777,  a  jail  fever  was  created,  and 
great  numbers  died.  During  its  prevalence  the  pris- 
oners were  marched  out  in  companies  of  twenty  to 
breathe  the  fresh  air  for  half  an  hour,  while  those 
within  divided  themselves  into  parties  of  six  each,  and 
then  alternately  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  standing  ten 
minutes  at  the  windows.  They  had  no  seats,  and  their 
beds  of  straw  were  filled  with  vermin.  They  might 
have  exchanged  this  horrid  tenement  for  the  com- 
fortable quarters  of  a  British  soldier  by  enlisting  in  the 
King's  service,  but  very  few  would  thus  yield  their 
principles.  They  each  preferred  to  be  among  the 
dozen  bodies  which  were  daily  carried  out  in  carts  and 
cast  into  the  ditches  and  morasses  beyond  the  city  lim- 
its. Sheds,  stables,  and  other  outhouses  received 
hundreds  of  prisoners,  who  suffered  terribly  from  cold 
and  hunger  during  the  winter  succeeding  their  capture 
at  Fort  Washington.  Few  now  live  to  recite  their  ex- 
perience of  this  horrid  sacrifice  to  the  demon  of  discord, 
and  humanity  would  gladly  drop  a  tear  upon  this 
chapter  of  the  dark  record  of  man's  wrongs,  and  blot 
it  out  forever.  Escapes,  death,  exchange  of  prisoners, 
and  a  more  humane  policy,  gradually  thinned  the 
ranks  of  the  sufferers  in  the  city  prisons,  and  when 
peace  came  few  were  left  therein  to  come  out  and  join 
in  the  general  jubilee.  Hundreds  had  left  their  brief 
records  upon  the  walls  and  beams  (the  initials  of  their 
names),  which  remained  until  these  prisons  were  de- 
molished. 

PRISON-SHIPS. 

The  sufferings  of  American  captives  in  British  hulks 
were  greater  even  than  those  in  prisons  on  land. 

The  prison-ships  were  intended  for  seamen  taken  on 
the   ocean,  y<  t   some  soldiers  were  confined  in  them. 

The  first  vessels  used  for  the  purpose  were  the  tran- 
sports in  which  the  cattle  and  other  stores  were  brought 
by  the  British  in  1776.  These  lay  in  Gravesend  Bay. 
and  there  many  of  the  prisoners  taken  in  the  battle 
near  Brooklyn  were  confined  until  the  British  took  pos- 
session of  New  York,  when  they  were  removed  to  prisons 
in  the  city,and  ihe  transports  were  anchored  in  the  Hud- 
son and  East  rivers.  In  1778  the  hulks  of  decaying  ships 
were  moored  in  the  Wallabout,  or  Wallebocht,  a  shel- 
tered bay  on  the  Long  Island  shore,  where  the  present 
Navy  Yard  is.  There,  in  succession,  the  Whitby. 
Good  Hope,  Scorpion,  Prince  0/  Wales,  Falmouth, 
Hunter,  Stromoyli,  and  half  a  dozen  of  less  note  were 
moored,  and  contained  hundreds  of  Americaa  seamen 
captured  on  the  high  seas.  The  sufferings  of  these 
captives  were  intense,  and  at  the  close  of  1779  they  set 
fire  to  two  of  them,  hoping  to  secure  their  liberty  or 
death. 

In  1780,  the  Jersey,  originally  a  sixty-four  gun  ship, 
(but,  because  unfit  for  service,  was  dismantled  in 
1776),  was  placed  in  the  Wallabout,  and  used  as  a 
prison-ship  till  the  close  of  the  war,  when  she  was  left  to 
decay  on  the  spot  where  her  victims  had  suffered.  Her 
companions  were  the  Strotftboli,  Hunter  and  Scorpion 


386 


LAFAYETTE'S  ESTIMATE  OF  WASHINGTON. 


that  is  great,  is  even  more  sublime  from  his  virtues  than  from  his  talents  ? 
Had  he  been  a  common  soldier,  had  he  been  an  obscure  citizen,  all  his 
neighbors  would  have  respected  him.  With  a  heart  and  mind  equally  well 
formed,  he  judged  both  of  himself  and  circumstances  with  strict  impartial 
ity.  Nature,  whilst  creating  him  expressly  for  that  Revolution,  conferred  an 
honor  upon  herself;  and,  to  show  her  work  to  the  greatest  possible  advan- 
tage, she  constituted  it  in  such  a  peculiar  manner  that  each  distinct  quality 
would  have  failed  in  producing  the  end  required,  had  it  not  been  sustained  by 
all  the  others.1 


then  used  as  hospitals.  The  latter  was  moored  in  the 
Hudson,  towards  Paulus's  Hook.  The  large  number 
confined  in  the  Jersey — sometimes  more  than  a  thou- 
sand at  a  time — and  the  terrible  suffering  which  occur- 
red there,  have  made  her  name  prominent,  and  her  his- 
tory a  synonyme  for  prison-ships  during  the  war.  Her 
crew  consisted  of  a  captain,  two  mates,  cook,  steward, 
and  a  dozen  sailors.  She  had  also  a  guard  of  twelve 
old  invalid  marines,  and  about  thirty  soldiers,  drafted 
from  British  and  Hessian  corps  lying  on  Long  Island. 
These  were  the  jailors  of  the  American  captives,  and 
were  the  instruments  of  great  cruelty.  Unwholesome 
food,  foul  air,  filth  and  despondency  soon  produced 
diseases  of  the  most  malignant  nature.  Dysentery, 
small-pox,  and  prison  fever  were  the  most  prevalent, 
and,  for  want  of  good  nurses  and  medical  attendants, 
they  died  by  scores  on  the  Jersey  and  the  hospital  ships. 
The  voice  of  human  sympathy  seldom  reached  the  ears 
of  the  captives,  and  despair  was  the  handmaid  of  con- 
tagion. No  systematic  efforts  for  their  relief  were 
made,  and,  because  of  the  contagious  character  of  the 
diseases,  no  person  ever  visited  the  hulks  to  bestow  a 
cheering  smile  or  a  word  of  consolation.  All  was  fune- 
real gloom,  and  hope  never  whispered  its  cheering 
promises  there.  When  the  crews  of  privateers  were 
no  longer  considered  prisoners  of  war  by  the  British 
(see  page  850),  the  number  of  captives  in  confinement 
fearfully  increased,  and  Congress  had  no  adequate 
equivalents  to  exchange.  Policy,  always  heartless,  for- 
bade the  exchange  of  healthy  British  prisoners  for 
emaciated  Americans,  and  month  after  month  the  hap- 
less captives  suffered,  and  then  died. 

The  name  and  character  of  each  prisoner  were  re- 
gistered when  he  first  came  on  board.  He  was  then 
placed  in  the  hold,  frequently  with  a  thousand  others,  a 
large  portion  of  them  covered  with  filthy  rags,  often 
swarming  with  vermin.  In  messes  of  six  they  received 
their  daily  food  every  morning,  which  generally  consisted 
of  mouldy  biscuits  filled  with  worms,  damaged  peas,  con- 
demned beef  and  pork,  sour  flour  and  meal,  rancid  but- 
ter, sometimes  a  little  filthy  suet,  but  never  any  vege- 
tables. Their  meat  was  boiled  in  a  large  copper  kettle. 
Those  who  had  a  little  money,  and  managed  to  avoid 
robbery  by  the  British  underlings,  sometimes  pur- 
chased bread,  sugar,  and  other  niceties,  which  an  old 
woman  used  to  bring  alongside  the  hulk  in  a  little  boat. 
Every  morning  the  prisoners  brought  up  their  bedding 
to  be  aired,  and,  after  washing  the  decks,  they  were 
allowed  to  remain  about  till  sunset,  when  they  were  or- 
dered below  with  imprecations,  and  the  savage  cry, 
'  Down  rebels,  down  ! '  The  hatches  were  then 
closed,  and  in  serried  ranks  they  lay  down  to  sleep,  if 
possible,  in  the  putrid  air  and  stifling  heat,  amid  the 
sighs  of  the  acutely  distressed  and  the  groans  of  the 
dying.  Each  morning  the  harsh  order  came  below, 
'Rebels,  turn  out  your  dead  J'  The  dead  were  se- 
lected from  the  living,  each  sewed  in  his  blanket,  if  he 
had  one,  and  thus  conveyed  in  a  boat  to  the  shore  by 
his  companions  under  a  guard  and  hastily  buried. 

'  By  feeble  hands  their  shallow  graves  were  made  ; 
No  stone  memorial  o'er  their  corpses  laid. 
In  barren  sands  and  far  from  home  they  lie, 
No  friend  to  shed  a  tear  when  passing  by.' 

Freneau. 

So  shallow  were  the  graves  of  the  dead  on  the  shores 
cf  th»  Wallabout,  that  while  the  ships  were  yet  sending 
forth  their  victims,  the  action  of  the    waves  and   the 


drifting  of  the  loose  sand  often  exposed  the  bones  of 
those  previously  buried.—  Lossing's  Field-book  of  th* 
Revolution,  vol  ii.,  pp.  658-661. 

1  Lafayette's  Memoirs,  vol.  i.,  pp.  64-65. 
After  Lafayette's  return  to  France  Dr.  Franklin  pre- 
sented to  him  the  sword  Congress  had  instructed  him 
to  have  made  in  Paris.     Franklin  wrote  : 

Passy,  24th  August,  1779. 
Sir: — The  Congress,  sensible  of  your  merit  towards 
the  United  States,  but  unable  adequately  to  reward  it, 
determined  to  present  you  with  a  sword,  as  a  small 
mark  of  their  grateful  acknowledgment :  they  directed 
it  to  be  ornamented  with  suitable  devices.  Some  of 
the  principal  actions  of  the  war,  in  which  you  distin- 
guished yourself  by  your  bravery  and  conduct,  are 
therefore  represented  upon  it.  These,  with  a  few  em- 
blematic figures,  all  admirably  well  executed,  make  its 
principal  value.  By  the  help  of  the  exquisite  artists  of 
France,  I  find  it  easy  to  express  everything  but  the 
sense  we  have  of  your  worth,  and  our  obligations  to  you : 
for  this,  figures  and  even  words  are  found  insufficient. 
I  therefore,  only  add  that,  with  the  most  profound  es- 
teem, I  have  the  honor  to  be 

B.  Franklin. 
P.  S .  — My  grandson  goes  to  Havre  with  the  sword, 
and  will  have  the  honor  of  presenting  it  to  you. 

Havre,  29th  August,  1779. 
Sir, — Whatever  expectations  might  have  been  raised 
from  the  sense  of  past  favors,  the  goodness  of  the 
United  States  to  me  has  ever  been  such,  that  on  every 
occasion  it  far  surpasses  any  idea  I  could  have  con- 
ceived. A  new  proof  of  that  flattering  truth  I  find  in 
the  noble  present  which  Congress  has  pleased  to  honor 
me  with,  and  which  is  offered  in  such  a  manner  by 
your  excellency  as  will  exceed  everything  but  the  feel- 
ings of  an  unbounded  gratitude. 

In  some  of  the  devices  I  cannot  help  finding  too  hon- 
orable a  reward  for  those  slight  services  which,  in  con- 
cert with  my  fellow-soldiers,  and  under  the  god-like 
American  hero's  orders,  I  had  the  good  fortune  to  ren- 
der. The  sight  of  those  actions,  when  I  was  a  witness 
of  American  bravery  and  patriotic  spirit,  I  shall  ever 
enjoy  with  that  pleasure  which  becomes  a  heart  glowing 
with  love  for  the  nation,  and  the  most  ardent  zeal  for 
its  glory  and  happiness.  Assurances  of  gratitude, 
which  I  beg  leave  to  present  to  your  excellency,  are 
much  too  inadequate  to  my  feelings,  and  nothing  but 
such  sentiments  can  properly  acknowledge  your  kind- 
ness towards  me.  The  polite  manner  in  which  Mr. 
Franklin  was  pleased  to  deliver  that  inestimable  sword 
lays  me  under  great  obligations  to  him,  and  demands 
my  particular  thanks. 

With  the  most  perfect  respect,  I  have  the  honor  to  be, 
etc. 

West  Point,  30/A  Se/t.,  1779, 
.  .  .  Your  forward  zeal  in  the  cause  of  liberty  ; 
your  singular  attachment  to  this  infant  world  ;  your  ar- 
dent and  persevering  efforts,  not  only  in  America,  but 
since  your  return  to  France,  to  serve  the  United  States  ; 
your  polite  attention  to  Americans,  and  your  strict  and 
uniform  friendship  for  me,  have  ripened  the  first  im- 
pressions of  esteem  and  attachment  which  I  imbibed 
for  you  in  such  perfect  love  and  gratitude,  as  neither 
time  nor  absence  can  impair.  This  will  warrant  my 
assuring  you  that,  whether  in  the  character  of  an 
officer  at  the  head  of  a  corps  of  gallant  Frenchmen,  ii 
circumstances  should  require  this  ;  whether  as  a  major 


THE  HARD-WON  FIELD  Oh  MONMOUTH.  387 

The  Battle  of  Monmouth. — Lord  Howe's  tournament  was  over ;  his  last  effort 
at  generalship  had  failed,  and  his  army  had  evacuated  Philadelphia1 — June  18, 
1778 — and  had  commenced  their  retreat  to  New  York.  But  their  march  was 
to  be  no  holiday  promenade  ;  in  fact,  they  had  enjoyed  thus  far,  very  few  such 
marches,  and  they  were  destined  to  see  fewer  still.  The  moment  their 
first  column  began  to  move  over  the  Delaware,  Washington  broke  up  his 
camp,  and  turning  their  backs  upon  the  gloomy  scenes  of  Valley  Forge,  the 
American  patriots  pressed  on  after  the  enemy.  Watching  his  opportunity,  as 
he  hung  along  the  rear  of  the  British  army,  Washington  succeeded,  on  the 
28th  of  June,  in  bringing  the  British  commander  to  an  engagement  at  Mon- 
mouth, where  he  fought  one  of  the  bravest  battles,  and  under  circumstances 
of  unforeseen  difficulties  gained,  one  of  the  finest  and  most  inspiriting  victories 
of  the  war.  It  was  Sunday,  the  28th  of  June,  and  the  hottest  day  of  the 
year.  All  through  the  day  men  were  dropping  dead  with  the  heat,  by  the 
side  of  comrades,  who  were  falling  by  musket-ball,  bayonet  thrust,  or  cannon 
shot. 

Both  armies  were  so  nearly  equal  in  numbers,  and  so  well  prepared  for  a 
great  battle,  that  the  fortunes  of  the  day  were  evidently  to  be  determined 
only  by  superiority  of  generalship.  Washington's  plan  had  been  so  well  con- 
ceived, and  he  was  so  assured  of  the  valor  of  his  troops,  who  were  eager  for 
the  contest,  that  nothing  was  likely  to  interfere  with  his  operations  except  the 
disloyalty,  not  to  say  open  treason,  of  Charles  Lee  on  the  field;  even  for 
this  he  was  prepared.  He  knew  that  Lee,  who  was  second  in  command,  was 
seeking  for  an  opportunity  now  on  a  battle-field  to  supersede  the  commander- 
in-chief,  and  thus  effect  the  main  object  of  his  ambition,  which  he  had  been 
unable  to  accomplish  by  dark  and  sullen  intrigues.  In  a  council  of  war  some 
days  before,  he  had  argued  strenuously  against  a  general  engagement,  and 
had  carried  most  of  the  brigadiers  with  him.  Seeing  that  he  had  no  heart  for 
the  business,  Washington  offered  the  command  of  his  division  to  Lafayette. 
Mortified  at  this  disgrace,  he  afterwards  desired  the  command  which  Wash- 
ington was  reluctant  to  give ;  but  Lee  appealed  to  Lafayette.  '  It  is  my 
fortune  and  honor  that  I  place  in  your  hands  ;  you  are  too  generous  to  cause 
the  loss  of  both.'  Lafayette  could  not  resist  the  appeal,  and  he  promised  the 
first  moment  he  could  see  Washington,  to  make  the  request.  It  was  granted 
to  Lafayette's  magnanimity,  but  was  very  nearly  attended  with  fatal  results. 
At  five  o'clock  in  the  morning,  when  Lee  should  have  moved  his  division  to 

general,  commanding  a  division  of  the  American  army ;  you,   and,    consequently,  participate  in   the   pleasure 

or  whether,  after  our  swords  and  spears  have  given  you  feel  in  the  prospect  of  again  becoming  a  parent : 

place  to  the  ploughshare  and  pruning-hook,  I  see  you  and  do  most  sincerely  congratulate  you  and  your  lady 

as  a  private  gentleman,  a  friend  and  companion,  I  shall  on  this  fresh  pledge  she  is  about  to  give  you  of  her  love, 
welcome  you   with  all   the  warmth  of  friendship  to  George  Washington. 

Columbia's   shores:  and,    in    the  latter  case,    to   my  J  To  the  loyalists  the  retreat  appeared  as  a  violation 

rural  cottage,  where  homely  fare  and  a  cordial  recep-  of  the  plighted  faith  of  the  British  King.     The  winter's 

tion  shall  be  substituted  for  delicacies  and  costly  living,  revelry  was  over,  honors  and  offices  turned  suddenly 

This,  from  past  experience,  I  know  you  can  submit  to  ;  to  bitterness  and  ashes  ;  papers  of  protection  were  be- 

and  if  the  lovely  partner  of  your  happiness  will  consent  come  only  an  opprobrium  and    a  peril.     Crowds   of 

to  participate  with  us  in  such  rural  entertainment  and  wretched  refugees,  with  all  of  their  possessions  which 

amusements,  I  can  undertake,  in  behalf  of  Mrs.  Wash-  they  could  transport,,  fled  with   the  army.     The  sky 

ington.    that  she  will  do  everything  in  her  power   to  sparkled  with  stars  ;  the  air  of  the  summer  night  was 

make  Virginia  agreeable  to  the  Marchioness.     My  inch-  soft  and  tranquil,  as  the  exiles,   broken  in  fortune  and 

nation  and  endeavors  to  do  this  cannot   be  doubted,  without  a  career,  went  in  despair  from  the  only  citf 

when  I  assure  you  that  I  love  everybody  that  is  dear  to  they  could  love.— Bancroft,  vol.  j  .,  p.  127. 


388  WASHINGTON'S  CURSE  ON  LEE. 

attack  the  rear  of  the  British  advance,  he  delayed,  evidently  tin  nigh  fear,  or  a 
design  to  break  up  the  plan  of  the  battle.  Lafayette  urged  him  to  go  for- 
ward, but  Lee  answered,  '  You  do  not  know  the  British  soldiers  ;  we  cannot 
stand  up  against  them.'  With  a  flash  Lafayette  saw  the  position,  and  sent  one 
of  his  staff  with  information  to  Washington  to  hasten  to  that  part  of  the  field. 
In  the  meantime  Clinton  sent  Cornwallis  with  two  regiments  of  cavalry, 
embracing  the  grenadiers,  guards,  and  Highlanders,  to  rout  Lee's  division. 
He  was  unwilling  to  resist  the  attack,  and  fled  precipitously  before  Cornwallis, 
Clinton  having  followed  up  with  a  body  of  upwards  of  six  thousand,  embracing 
the  flower  of  the  British  army.  Other  messengers  had  reached  Washington, 
and  he  hurried  to  the  narrow  defile  through  which  Lee's  division  was  rushing 
in  confusion  and  terror.  Dashing  up  to  Lee  with  the  terrible  anger  of  a 
betrayed  commander,  '  What  is  the  meaning  of  all  this  cowardly  retreat  ?  \ 
The  abashed  traitor  stammered  out,  '  You  know  this  battle  was  undertaken 
against  my  advice.'  \  Why  then,  in  God's  name,  did  you  undertake  this  com- 
mand ?     Back  to  the  rear,  you  accursed  villain  ! ' 

Those  who  witnessed  that  scene,  said  that  the  sight  of  Washington's  majes- 
tic form,  transported  with  that  fearful  indignation,  arrested  that  division  as 
though  a  bolt  from  heaven  had  fallen  in  their  front.  Whatever  was  to  be 
done  now,  had  to  be  done  quickly.  All  eyes  were  fixed  on  the  commander, 
and  every  order  instantly  obeyed.  Two  of  the  regiments  of  Wayne's  flying 
brigade  were  formed  by  Washington  in  person  on  solid  ground,  as  they  had 
been  retreating  over  a  narrow  road,  bounded  on  either  side  by  a  morass.  In 
the  meantime  Washington's  own  division  had  reached  the  spot,  and  thejm- 
petuous  charges  of  Clinton  and  Cornwallis  were  arrested ;  but  the  victory 
had  yet  to  be  won.  Order  had  been  invoked,  and  it  came  out  of  confusion. 
Every  division  stood  firm — every  battalion  obeyed  orders — every  detachment 
struck  the  enemy  in  the  very  quarter  where  they  were  sent.  At  every  point 
Clinton  was  out-generalled.  Two  brigades  hung  on  his  right,  and  another  on 
his  left,  while  the  main  army  pressed  steadily  forward,  and  victoriously 
planted  their  standards  on  the  field  of  battle.  It  had  been  a  fierce  conflict. 
Wayne  afterwards  said  that  '  the  fires  of  heaven,  earth,  and  hell  were  blazing 
all  through  the  day.'  At  last  night  came,  and  the  American  army — except 
detachments  that  were  taking  care  of  the  sick — slept  upon  their  arms,  ready 
to  renew  the  battle  with  the  coming  daylight,  resolved  either  to  take  the 
British  army  captive,  or  rout  them  utterly.  But  when  the  light  of  the  next 
morning  rose  on  the  field,  and  unveiled  the  surrounding  woods  to  which  the 
repulsed  foe  had  retreated,  they  found  that  he  had  disappeared. 

Clinton  Escapes  in  the  Night. — The  new  British  commander-in-chief  had 
seen  enough  of  Washington,  for  the  present  at  least,  and  he  abandoned  in  the 
night  his  sick  and  wounded,  with  the  three  hundred  men  he  had  left  dead  on 
the  field, — among  them  the  brave  Lieutenant-Colonel  Monckton,  who  fell  at 
the  head  of  his  grenadiers  so  bravely  that  he  was  buried  by  Washington's 
order  with  military  honors, — and  the  three  hundred  corpses  of  the  men  who  aad 


^C      ^^J 


THE  MASSACRE  OF  WYOMING.  389 

been  taken  from  their  homes  to  be  immolated  on  these  distant  altars  of  des . 
potism,  found  their  repose  in  the  soil  of  a  country  which  had  done  them  no 
wrong.  The  wounded  of  this  battle, — as  were  the  wounded  of  the  enemy 
during  the  war — were  cared  for  with  kindness — a  far  larger  portion  of  them 
living  to  bless  their  enemies,  than  ever  survived  among  our  wounded  who 
fell  under  the  tender  mercies  of  British  invaders. 

Clinton's  army  lost  no  time  in  marching  to  Sandy  Hook,  where  they  were 
transported  by  the  fleet  to  New  York,  which  remained  the  headquarters  of  the 
British  commander-in-chief  till  the  close  of  the  war.  Washington  marched 
to  White  Plains  on  the  east  of  the  Hudson,  where  he  could  watch  the  enemy. 

The  Massacre  of  Wyoming. — Worsted  on  the  field  of  open  battle,  the 
British  endeavored  to  make  up  in  Indian  slaughter,  for  what  could  not  be 
achieved  by  honorable  warfare.  While  the  terrible  tragedy  of  which  we  must 
give  a  brief  account,  was  being  enacted  'on  Susquehanna's  side,'  the  author  of 
the  immortal  poem,  *  Gertrude  of  Wyoming,'  then  an  infant  nine  months  old, 
was  sleeping  in  his  Scotch  cradle.  The  late  William  L.  Stone,  in  speaking  of 
the  first  glance  into  this  paradise  vale  to  the  westward,  says  :  '  From  the  brow  of 
the  Pocono  range,  it  lies  at  the  depth  of  a  thousand  feet,  distinctly  defined  by 
the  double  barrier  of  nearly  parallel  mountains,  between  which  it  is  em- 
bosomed. There  is  a  beetling  precipice  upon  the  verge  of  the  eastern 
barrier,  called  "  Prospect  Rock,"  from  the  top  of  which  nearly  the  entire  val- 
ley can  be  surveyed  at  a  single  view,  forming  one  of  the  richest  and  most 
beautiful  landscapes  upon  which  the  eye  of  man  ever  rested.  Through  the 
centre  of  the  valley  flows  the  Susquehanna,  the  winding  course  of  which  can 
be  traced  the  whole  distance.  Several  green  islands  slumber  sweetly  in  its 
embrace,  while  the  sight  revels  amidst  the  garniture  of  fields  and  woodlands  ; 
and  to  complete  the  picture,  low  in  the  distance  may  be  dimly  seen  the 
borough  of ,  Wilkes-Barre — especially  the  spires  of  its  churches.  The  length 
of  the  valley,  from  the  Lackawannock  Gap,  where  the  Susquehanna  plunges 
into  it  through  a  narrow  defile  of  high  rocky  mountains  at  the  north,  to  a  like 
narrow  pass  called  the  Nanticoke  Gap  at  the  south,  is  nearly  twenty  miles, 
averaging  about  three  miles  in  width.  It  is  walled  in  by  ranges  of  steep 
mountains  of  about  one  thousand  feet  in  height  on  the  eastern  side,  and  eight 
hundred  on  the  western.' 

That  secluded  and  picturesque  valley  had  been  chosen,  long  before  the 
Revolution,  as  the  home  of  a  colony  from  Connecticut — emigrating  under  the 
authority  of  its  royal  charter x — and  perhaps  in  all  the  world  there  was  not  a 

1  'This  vale  was  first  inhabited  by  the  Delaware  and  'The  Count  was  alone  in  his  tent,  reclining  upon  a 
Shawanese  Indians,  whose  little  villages  dotted  either  bundle  of  dry  weeds  designed  for  his  bed,  and  engaged 
side  of  the  river.  When  Count  Zinzendorf  [in  1742],  in  writing,  or  in  devout  meditation,  when  the  assassins 
the  great  founder  and  apostle  of  the  Moravians,  visited  who  had  secretly  determined  on  his  death,  crept  steal- 
Pennsylvania  to  look  after  the  infant  missions  which  the  thily  to  the  tent  upon  their  murderous  errand.  A 
'United  Brethren'  had  founded,  he  made  several  blanket-curtain,  suspended  upon  pins,  formed  the  door 
journeys  through  those  wilderness  regions  with  the  be-  of  his  tent,  and  by  gently  raising  a  corner  of  the  cur- 
nevolent  purpose  of  extending  among  them  the  blessing  tain,  the  Indians,  undiscovered,  had  a  full  view  of  tho 
of  Christianity.  He  fearlessly  penetrated  to  the  settle-  venerable  patriarch,  unconscious  of  lurking  danger,  and 
ments  of  tfce  Shawanese,  without  protection,  although  with  the  calmness  of  a  saint  upon  his  benignant  fea- 
that  tribe  was  the  most  savage  and  remorseless  of  all  rures.  They  were  awe-stricken  by  his  appearance, 
tbt  Pennsy! v inia  Ind-ans.  But  this  was  not  alL     It  was  a  cool  night  in  Septen? 


39°  THE  DOOMED  GARDEN  VALE. 

more  virtuous,  contented,  or  prosperous  people.  They  numbered  about  two 
thousand,  exclusive  of  nearly  four  hundred  young  and  vigorous  men,  who 
were  in  distant  fields  of  conflict,  fighting  the  national  battles.  It  would  seem 
that  malignity  itself  might  have  chosen  some  other  spot  for  its  work  of  deso 
lation. 

The  Indians  of  the  Six  Nations  had  not  been  brought  actively  into  the 
field  against  the  Colonists  until  the  summer  of  1777.  But  the  skilful  diplo- 
macy of  Sir  William  Johnson  with  his  British  gold,  generous  presents,  and  un- 
bounded hospitality,1  had  won  over  most  of  the  Indian  chiefs  ;  and,  fired  by 
the  atrocious  spirit  of  the  Tories  who  lived  or  went  amongst  them,  a  secret 
expedition  for  the  destruction  of  the  Colony  of  Wyoming  was  planned  by  Col. 
John  Butler  with  his  own  Tory  Rangers,  which  formed  a  detachment  of  the 
Royal  Greens,  who,  with  seven  hundred  Indians,  constituted  a  force  of  inva- 
ders of  eleven  hundred  men.  The  expedition  moved  from  Niagara  through 
the  Genesee  country,  and  down  the  Chemung  river  to  Tioga  Point,  and  there 
embarking  on  the  Susquehanna,  they  landed  about  twenty  miles  above  Wyo- 
ming, where  Butler  established  his  headquarters,  near  the  western  entrance 
to  the  valley.     A  few  days  had  completed  his  preparations. 

The  banks  of  the  Susquehanna  were  blushing  in  the  purple  light  of  sum- 
mer ;  the  hills  were  crowned  with  verdure,  and  the  valleys  stood  thick  with 
corn.  Silently  and  stealthily,  as  the  pestilence  goes,  the  fiends  came  down 
upon  this  scene  of  unutterable  beauty.  On  their  approach,  terror  spread 
through  the  settlement,  and  hundreds  of  gentle  hearts  trembled  with  the 
wildest  apprehensions.     Col.  Zebulon  Butler — a  noble  patriot,  though  a  near 

ber,  and  the  Count  had  kindled  a  small  fire  for  his  spring.  During  a  visit  which  he  made  shortly  after  to 
comfort.  Warmed  by  the  flame,  a  large  rattlesnake  Mr.  Campbell,  an  intimate  friend  of  his  at  Schenec- 
had  crept  from  its  cover  and  approaching  the  fire  for  tady,  the  conversation  turned  upon  the  subject  of  the 
its  greater  enjoyment,  glided  harmlessly  over  one  of  the  disputes  between  the  colonies  and  the  mother-country, 
legs  of  the  holy  man,  whose  thoughts  at  the  moment  were  He  then  said  he  should  never  7zve  to  see  them  in  a 
not  occupied  upon  the  grovelling  things  of  earth,  state  of  open  war.  At  a  coun  held  in  Johnstown  for 
He  perceived  not  the  serpent,  but  the  Indians  with  Tryon  County,  he  received  a  foreign  package.  He 
breathless  attention  had  observed  the  whole  move-  was  in  the  court-house  when.it  was  handed  him.  He 
ment  of  the  poisonous  reptile  ;  and  as  they  gazed  immediately  left  the  house  and  walked  over  to  the  Hall, 
upon  the  aspect  and  attitude  of  the  Count,  and  saw  the  This  package  was  afterwards  understood  to  have  con- 
serpent  offering  him  no  harm,  they  changed  their  minds  tained  instructions  to  him  to  use  his  influence  in  en- 
as  suddenly  as  the  barbarians  of  Malta  did  theirs  in  re-  gaging  the  Indians  in  favor  of  England,  in  case  war 
gard  to  the  shipwrecked  prisoner  who  shook  the  viper  should  break  out.  If  such  were  the  instructions  to  Sir 
from  his  hand  without  feeling  even  a  smart  from  its  William,  his  situation  was  indeed  trying.  On  the  one 
venomous  fangs.  Their  enmity  was  immediately  side  was  the  English  government,  which  had  so  highly 
changed  into  reverence,  and  in  the  belief  that  their  in-  honored  and  enriched  him,  and  on  the  other  his  own 
tended  victim  enjoyed  the  special  protection  of  the  adopted  country,  whose  armies  he  had  led  to  victory, 
Great  Spirit,  they  desisted  from  their  bloody  purpose  with  many  warm  personal  friends  who  entertained  a 
and  retired.  Thenceforward  the  Count  was  regarded  great  respect  for  him,  and  who  had  fought  by  his  side 
by  the  Indians  with  the  most  profound  veneration.' —  during  the  previous  wars.  A  spirit  like  his  could  not  bu» 
History  of  Wyoming^  by  William  L.  Stone,  pp.  96,  have  foreseen  the  dreadful  consequences  of  employing 
97-  such  a  force  as  the  Indians  in  such  a  war.     His  death 

1  '  Sir  William  built  a  house  at  the  village  of  John-  followed  immediately  before  the  rising  of  the  court, 

stown,  where  he  chiefly  lived  during  the  latter  part  of  Rumor  said  he  died  by  poison,  administered  by  him- 

his  life.     The  house  which  he  built  on  this  road  (along  self;  but  perhaps   extreme  excitement  of  mind  thus 

the  Mohawk  River)  was  occupied  by  Sir  John.    Colonel  suddenly  put  an  end  to  a  life  already  protracted   to  a 

Guy  Johnson  built  a  house  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  middling  old  age.     He  was  buried  under  the  old  stone 

road  a  little  further  down  the  river.     Here  these  men  church  at  Johnstown.     His  bones  were  taken  up  in 

lived,  essentially  in  the  rank,  and  with  not  a  small  part  1806,  and  redeposited.     In  the  coffin  was  found  the 

of  the  splendor  of  noblemen.     But  when  they  joined  ball  with  which  he  was  wounded   at  Lake   George, 

the  British  standard  their  property  vanished  in  a  mo-  which  had  never  been  extracted,  and  which  ever  after 

ment,  and  with  it  their  consequence,  their  enjoyments,  occasioned  lameness.     His   most  valuable  papers,  in- 

and  probably  their  hopes.  eluding  his  will  (said  to  be  a  very  singular  document), 

1  Many  accounts  are  still  given  of  the  rustic  sports  were  buried  in  an  iron  chest  in  his  garden,  where  they 

encouraged  by  Sir  William,  and  of  the  influence  which  were  much   injured   by   the   dampness  of  the  earth. 

he  exerted  over  the  Indians  and  white  inhabitants.    He  They  were  taken  away  by  his  son,  Sir  John,  during 

died  July  nth,  1774,  aged  59  years.     There  is  some-  the  war.' — Border  Warfare  of  N.  Y.,  by  Hon.  Wm. 

ming  still  my-sterious  connected  with  his  death.     He  W.  Campbell,  pp.  245-247. 
had  been  out  to  England,  and  returned  the  previous 


DESOLATION  OF  THE  HAPPY  VALLEY.  391 

relative  of  the  Tory  leader — being  then  at  home  on  a  brief  visit  from  the 
army,  had  hastily  gathered  together  what  fragments  of  the  shattered  and 
broken  militia  he  could,  and  he  advanced  to  the  unequal  struggle.  Desperate 
as  were  the  chances,  and  fearful  the  odds,  the  betrayed  colonists  resisted  the 
onset  with  unparalleled  heroism  ;  but,  overwhelmed  by  numbers,  the  defend- 
ers, amounting  perhaps  to  four  hundred,  were  hopelessly  cut  down.  The 
spear  and  the  tomahawk  did  their  dreadful  work.  But  the  battle,  which  began 
at  four  o'clock,  was  desperately  contested  till  dark. 

Night  revealed  still  greater  horrors.  Those  who  had  escaped  immediate 
vleath  fled  to  Fort  Wyoming  and  Old  Forty,  two  feeble  stockade  defences, 
where  the  old  men,  the  women  and  their  children,  with  the  sick,  the  infirm 
and  the  dying,  had  ere  this  sought  shelter.  '  Naked,  panting  and  bloody,  the 
few  who  had  escaped  came  rushing  into  Wilkesbarre  Fort,  where,  trembling 
with  anxiety,  the  women  and  children  were  gathered,  waiting  the  dread  issue. 
The  appalling  "  all  is  lost"  proclaimed  their  utter  helplessness.  They  fly  to 
the  mountains — the  evening  is  approaching.  The  dreary  swamp  and  the 
"Shades  of  Death"  [the  name  of  the  morass  where  so  many  dragged  them- 
selves to  die]  before  them — the  victorious  hell-hounds. are  opening  on  their 
track.  They  look  back  on  the  valley — all  around  the  flames  of  desolation 
are  kindling.  They  cast  their  eyes  in  the  range  of  the  battle-field — numerous 
fires  speak  their  own  horrid  purpose.  They  listen !  The  exulting  yell  of  the 
savage  strikes  the  ear  !  Again  a  shriek  of  agonizing  woe  !  Who  is  the  suf- 
ferer ?     It  is  the  husband  of  one  who  is  gazing  ! — the  father  of  her  children.' ' 

The  prisoners  who  had  not  fallen  dead  on  the  field  were  reserved  for  torture. 
On  a  flat  rock,  two  miles  north  of  Fort  Forty,  twenty-five  of  them  were  enclosed 
by  a  circle  of  Indians,  and  their  squaws  rushed  up  and  struck  their  heads  open 
with  the  tomahawk,  while  over  their  warm,  bleeding  bodies  these  priestesses 
of  the  sacrifice  chanted  their  horrible  incantations ;  and  the  victorious  war- 
songs  of  the  chiefs  rang  out  on  the  night-mantled  mountains.  The  brutal 
vengeance  of  the  savages  was  glutted  for  the  night.  Fort  Wyoming,  which 
had  been  the  chief  place  of  refuge,  was  spared  till  the  next  morning,  when  the 
savage  band  came  up  with  their  petrifying  yells,  throwing  down  before  horri- 
fied innocence  and  affection,  upwards  of  two  hundred  scalps  of  the  beings 
best  loved  on  earth.  Scenes  followed  too  frightful  to  relate.  Every  dwelling 
in  the  vale  was  a  smoking  ruin ;  and  the  mangled  corpses  of  over  three  hun- 
dred of  the  late  dwellers  of  the  happy  valley  lay  scattered  on  the  plain. 

Indian  Slaughter  the  Policy  of  the  War. — This  Wyoming  Massacre  was  a 
part  of  the  policy  of  the  British  ministry,  settled  in  the  councils  of  the  king  in 
his  own  palace,  and  persisted  in  by  him  from  the  beginning  to  the  close  of 
the  war.  It  was  not  an  inspiration  of  mere  slaughter  for  an  emergency,  nor 
was  the  ministry  ever  able  to  fasten  the  responsibility  of  these  deeds  upon 
their  subordinates.  As  I  have  already  shown,  it  was  as  much  a  part  of  the 
machinery  for  subjugating  the  Colonies,  as  regular  troops,  munitions  of  war 

1  Hon.  Charles  Miner's  letters. 


392  INDIAN  SLA  UGHTER— BRITISH  POLICY. 

or  a  commissariat.  The  Colonies  would  not  be  taxed  without  representation, 
and  they  must  be  made  to  do  it.  When  it  could  not  be  done  by  a  regulat 
army,  with  brave  men  well  managed  in  battle,  the  wives  and  mothers,  the 
babes  and  daughters  of  Americans  must  be  scalped  and  brained  by  the  toma- 
hawk in  their  defenceless  dwellings  along  unprotected  settlements.  No  fur- 
ther proof  is  needed  than  official  documents  thickly  strewn  through  the  records 
of  that  period.1  Revolting  as  it  is,  the  same  record  must  be  repeated  in 
every  impartial  history. 

The  sentimentalism  of  the  present  age  may  plead  that  such  recitals  should 
not  be  revived.  But  when  we  read  that  these  atrocities  were  conceived  by  a 
great  sovereign,  and  the  ministers  of  a  great  empire,  and  their  execution  made 
imperative  upon  their  officers, — when  instructions  were  sent  to  '  spare  neithei 
age,  sex,  nor  condition' — that  the  infant  that  had  not  yet  learned  to  speak  its 
mother's  name,  and  the  aged,  standing  by  the  grave,  were  stricken  down  by 
the  same  tomahawk — that  young  girls  were  butchered  in  the  presence  of  their 
mothers,  and  wherever  the  savages  were  attended,  as  they  generally  were, 
by  British  soldiers,  or  Tories,  or  other  allies  in  ther  employment,  the  persons 
of  the  maidens  were  first  violated  and  then  killed — I  know  of  no  reason  why 
this  record  should  be  blotted  out :  on  the  contrary,  I  think  it  should  be  pre- 
served for  two  reasons — first,  to  show  the  atrocities  of  war,  and  second,  ho\i 
exacting  and  merciless  is  despotism  in  its  outrages  on  human  rights.  It  has, 
indeed,  often  been  attempted  by  English  apologists  to  extenuate  the  guilt 
of  the  crime  ;  they  have  spoken  of  the  mistakes  that  were  committed,  and  that 
even  English  women  were  killed  by  the  Indian  allies  of  Great  Britain. 

But  these  heartless  cruelties  admit  of  no  defence.  There  was  here  no 
Cawnpore  massacre  to  avenge ;  America  had  no  Nana  Sahib  ;  nor  had  any 
cruelties  been  perpetrated  upon  Romans  by  Carthaginian  conquerors  in  some 
Punic  war.  Nor  would  we  recur  to  such  records  to  inflame  a  spirit  of 
patriotism.  We  have  no  Hannibals  to  lead  to  the  altar  to  swear  eternal 
vengeance  on  our  enemies.  But  it  does  no  harm  to  have  some  millions  of 
the  descendants  of  those  victims  of  British  tyranny  sometimes  remember  the 
names,  or  the  deeds  of  ancestors  who  died  such  fearful  deaths.  They  will 
love  their  country  none  the  less,  nor  will  they  on  the  land  or  the  sea  love  the 
enemies  of  their  country  any  better,  if  they  should  ever  be  called  to  meet 
them  in  battle. 

It  is  estimated  by  careful  computation,  that  during  the  Revolutionary  War, 
not  less  than  thirty  thousand  Indian  warriors  were  hired  to  butcher  our 
people,  to  burn  their  dwellings,  and  desolate  their  homes.  It  has  even  been 
supposed  by  judicious  writers,  that  more  persons  died  by  this  species  of  mur- 
der, than  were' slain  in  open  battle.     I  am  well  aware  that  ministers  were  in* 

x  Col.  Gansevoort,  in  a  letter  under  date  of  July  29th,  cape,  wounded  by  two  balls  shot  through  her  shoulder, 

confirms   the   statement,    that   St.   Leger  had   offered  The  foregoing  statements  need  no  comment.     The  men 

twenty  dollars  for  every  American  scalp.     Small  par-  who  employed  such  instruments,  and  who  stimulated 

ties  of  Indians  were  then  lurking  around.     A  few  days  them  by  promises  and  rewards,  have  received  the  just 

before,  he  adds,  a  firing  was  heard  in  the  woods  about  execration  of  an  indignant  people.     I  shall  leave  it  tc 

five  hundred  yards  from  the  fort.     On  sallying  out,  it  the  reader  to  compare  their  conduct  with  their  profes- 

was  found  that  the  Indians  had  fired  upon  three  young  sions. — Border  Warfare  0/  New  York,  by  WillLin.' 

girls  who  were  engaged  picking  berries.     Two  of  them  W.  Campbell, 
were  killed  and  scalped,  and  the  third  made  her  es- 


FRENCH  FLEET  IN  AMERICAN  WA  TERS.  39J 

jignantly  rebuked  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  in  the  House  of  Lords,  as 
•veil  as  by  humane  and  just  Englishmen  everywhere,  for  this  atrocious  policy 
But  when  we  were  forced  in  1812,  into  the  Second  War  for  Independence, 
these  rebukes  proved  to  have  been  unheeded  ;  for  the  same  means  were  re- 
sorted  to  then  j  and  if  a  collision  at  this  late  day  should  come  with  the  British 
empire,  it  would  doubtless  be  resorted  to  once  more.  True,  such  a  contin- 
gency may  not  now  seem  probable  j  for  British  statesmen  in  cur  immediate 
times,  seem  more  disposed  to  achieve  conquests  by  the  peaceful  and  omnipo- 
tent sway  of  commerce,  than  by  the  old  instruments  of  savagery  vvhich  have 
so  often  darkened  the  history  of  their  former  conquests. 

The  French  Fleet  in  American  Waters.  —  The  destination  of  Count 
D'Estaing's  fleet  had  been  the  mouth  of  the  Delaware.  Learning  however, 
that  the  British  fleet  was  safe  in  Raritan  Bay — because  the  heavy  French  men- 
of-war  could  not  pass  the  bar  at  Sandy  Hook — the  French  admiral,  with  the 
concurrence  of  Washington,  spread  his  sails  for  Newport  to  assist  the  Ameri- 
cans in  driving  the  British  from  Rhode  Island,  where  preparations  were  made 
for  attacking  them  by  land  and  sea.1 

Closing  of  the  Year  1778. — The  war  of  the  Revolution  had  now  been  going 
on  nearly  four  years,  and  when  the  campaign  of  1778  was  closed,  our  enemies 
found  little  cause  for  congratulation.  After  all  their  expenditure  of  life  and 
treasure,  they  were  still  hemmed  in  on  two  islands — New  York  and  Rhode 
Island — two  hundred  miles  apart,  while  the  Republicans  held  every  other 
stronghold  in  the  country.  On  the  third  of  November,  D'Estaing  had  sailed 
for  the  West  Indies  to  attack  the  British  possessions,  and  the  English  fleet  was 
obliged  to  follow  him  to  defend  them. 

A  Campaign  against  the  Southern  States.  —  Utterly  defeated  in  some 
places,  and  foiled  in  others,  and  seeing  little  hope  of  striking  an  effectual  blow 
at  the  North,  their  armies  were  directed  towards  the  Southern  States.  Sir 
Henry  Clinton  sent  three  thousand  men  to  Georgia,  under  Colonel  Campbell. 

1  Lafayette  describes  the  position  :   '  General  Wash-  English  admiral  suddenly  cut  his  cables  and  fled  at 

ington.  wishing  to  make  a  diversion  on  Rhode  Island,  full  sail,  warmly  pursued  by  all  our  vessels  with  the 

ordered    General    Sullvan.    who  commanded    in  that  admiral   at   the  head.      This  spectacle  was  given  dur- 

State,    to    assemble  his  troops.     The    fleet    stationed  ing  the  finest  weather  possible,  and  within  sight  of  the 

itself  in  the  channel  which  leads  to  Newport,  and  I  was  English  and  American  armies.   I  never  felt  so  proud  as 

ordered  to  conduct  a  detachment  of  the  great  army  to  on  that  day. 

General  Sullivan,  who  is  my  senior  in  command.  Af-  '  'The  next  Jay  when  the  victory  was  on  the  point  of 
ter  many  delays  which  were  very  annoying  to  the  fleet,  being  completed,  and  the  guns  of  the  Languedoc  were 
and  many  circumstances  which  it  would  be  too  long  to  directed  towards  the  English  fleet,  at  this  most  glori 
relate,  all  our  preparations  were  made,  and  we  landed  ous  moment  for  the  French  navy,  a  sudden  gale,  fel- 
on the  island  with  twelve  thousand  men,  many  of  them  lowed  by  a  dreadful  storm,  separated  and  dispersed 
militia,  of  whom  I  commanded  one-half  upon  the  left  the  French  vessels,  Howe's  vessels,  and  those  of  Bi- 
side.  M.  D'Estaing  had  entered  the  channel  the  day  ron,  which,  by  a  singular  accident,  had  just  arrived 
before  in  spite  of  the  English  batteries.  General  Pigot  there.  The  Languedoc  and  the  Marseillaise  were  dis- 
hau  enclosed  himself  in  the  respectable  fortifications  of  masted,  and  the  Ccesar  was  afterwards  unheard  of  for 
Newp-irt.  The  evening  of  our  arrival,  the  English  some  time.  To  find  the  English  fleet  was  impossible, 
fleet  appeared  before  the  channel  with  all  the  vessels  M.  D'Estaing  returned  to  Rhode  Island,  remained 
that  Lord  Howe  had  been  able  to  collect,  and  a  rein-  two  days  to  ascertain  whether  General  Sullivan  wished 
forcement  of  four  thousand  men  for  the  enemy,  who  had  to  retire,  and  then  entered  the  Boston  harbor.  Dur- 
already  from  five  to  six  thousand  men.  A  north  wind  ing  these  various  cruises,  the  fleet  took  or  burnt  six 
blew  most  fortunately  for  us  the  next  day,  and  the  English  frigates,  and  a  large  number  of  vessels  of 
French  fleet,  passing  gallantly  under  a  sharp  fire  from  which  several  were  armed  ;  and  they  also^  cleared  the 
the  batteries,  to  which  they  replied  with  broadside  coast  and  opened  the  harbors.' — Lafayette's  AJemoirs, 
shot,  prepared  themselves  to  accept  the  conflict  which  vol.  i.,  pp.  208-209. 
Lord  Howe  iv.-»s  apparently  proposing  to  them.      The 


394  A  MARAUDING  EXPEDITION  TO  VIRGINIA. 

An  attack  was  made  upon  Savannah,  December  29,  1778,  which,  being  in  ar 
unprotected  condition,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy  after  an  obstinate 
resistance.  The  Americans  were  obliged  to  retire,  and  they  hurried  on  by 
forced  marches  to  South  Carolina.  Georgia  was  then  one  of  the  feeblest  of 
the  Colonies ;  and  it  is  doubtful  if,  even  with  larger  means  of  resistance  at 
her  disposal,  she  would  have  felt  prepared  to  go  into  the  Revolution  with  so 
much  decision,  and  at  so  early  a  period  as  South  Carolina,  and  the  other 
States.  She  was  the  only  colony  in  which  a  legislature  assembled  under 
royal  authority,  after  the  Declaration  of  Independence.  Her  devotion,  how- 
ever, to  the  national  cause  was  afterwards  signally  demonstrated. 

General  Lincoln  takes  Command  of  the  Southern  Forces. — St.  Augustine  was 
held  by  the  British  troops  under  the  command  of  General  Prevost.  He 
received  orders  from  Clinton  to  march  to  Savannah,  where,  by  efficient  action, . 
he  soon  unfurled  the  royal  standard  from  every  important  post,  and  all 
Georgia  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  royalists.  The  British  believed  that  the 
Tories  of  the  South  constituted  a  leading  portion  of  the  entire  community ; 
and  acting  upon  this  belief,  they  moved  up  the  river  to  Augusta,  where  emis- 
saries were  sent  out,  to  stir  up  the  royalists  to  arms,  by  promise  of  great 
rewards,  and  the  gratification  of  every  personal  revenge.  Colonel  Boyd  got 
together  a  formidable  force,  and  commenced  the  work  of  pillage  and  destruc- 
tion on  his  march  ;  but  he  was  met  by  a  detachment  of  brave  Carolinians, 
under  Colonel  Pickens,  who,  after  a  hard  contest,  put  them  to  utter  rout. 
General  Lincoln,  with  his  headquarters  at  Charleston,  sent  his  detachment 
of  two  thousand  of  the  Carolina  militia,  to  take  one  of  the  strongest 
positions  the  British  held  in  Georgia;  but  he  was  surprised  by  General 
Prevost,  and  his  raw  recruits  were  put  to  flight.  They  fled  almost 
without  firing  a  gun,  and  many  of  them  in  their  precipitation  were  lost  in  the 
marshes,  or  drowned  in  the  river.  Having  thus  succeeded  in  establishing  the 
royal  authority  in  Georgia,  a  colonial  government  was  organized  by  General 
Prevost,  who  carried  the  war  into  South  Carolina,  succeeded  in  driving  the 
Americans,  under  General  Moultrie,  from  Black  Swamp  and  Puryburg,  and 
appeared  before  Charleston  on  the  nth  of  May.  But  that  city  was  too 
bravely  defended  by  General  Lincoln  and  Governor  Rutledge,  to  be 
taken. 

Clinton  sends  a  Marauding  Expedition  to  Virginia. — Irritated  at  the  par- 
tial failure  of  -.he  British  attempts  in  the  South,  Sir  Henry  Clinton  sent,  in 
May,  a  fleet  from  New  York,  with  two  thousand  men  under  Gen.  Matthews, 
to  ravage  and  conquer  Virginia.  Every  town  they  could  reach,  they  reduced 
to  ashes — Portsmouth,  Norfolk.  Gosport,  and  Suffolk  were  indiscriminately 
and  barbarously  burned.  But  no  impression  was  made  upon  the  mass  of  the 
people,  except  to  inspire  them  with  a  still  more  determined  spirit  of  oppo- 
sition to  their  barbarous  foe.     Clinton  recalled  his  troops  to  New  York. 

Once  more  the  British  commanders  attempted  to  carry  out  their  favoritf 


ANTHONY  WA  YNE  STORMS  STONY  POINT.  39$ 

scheme  of  establishing  a  line  of  posts  along  the  Hudson,  from  New  York  to 
Canada,  to  cut  off  communication  between  the  Eastern  and  Southern  States. 
Gen.  Clinton  advanced  and  got  possession,  June  1st,  of  the  important  forts  of 
Stony,  and  Verplank's  Points. 

Mad  Anthony  Wayne  storms  Stony  Point. — It  commands  the  Hudson  from 
the  west  side  of  the  river,  and  was  one  of  the  most  important  positions  in  the 
whole  country.  After  its  works  had  been  completed  by  the  British,  it  was 
regarded  as  almost  impregnable.  Standing  where  it  was  washed  by  the  rivei 
on  two  sides,  and  protected  by  a  swamp  overflowed  by  the  tide  on  the  other 
side,  garrisoned  by  six  hundred  men  and  two  rows  of  abattis,  it  was  a  bold  en- 
terprise to  undertake  its  reduction.  But  Washington  deemed  Gen.  Wayne 
equal  to  the  enterprise,1  and  with  twelve  hundred  men,  on  the  15th  of  July, 
1779,  ne  marched  fourteen  miles  through  a  wild,  rugged  country,  passing 
lofty  heights,  narrow  defiles,  and  deep  morasses  till  evening,  when  he  found 
himself  within  a  mile  of  the  fort.  Success  depended  now  chiefly  on  silence 
and  secrecy,  and  the  entire  body  marched  with  unloaded  muskets,  and  fixed 
bayonets,  approaching  the  fort  in  two  divisions  on  opposite  sides.  In  the 
mean  time  the  tide  had  overflown  the  marsh  ;  but  these  determined  men  went 
straight  through  it.  At  last  the  advance-guard  reached  the  palisade,  and  began 
their  attack.  The  shout  of  alarm  was  set  up  by  the  sentinels,  but  from  the  ad- 
vance column  rang  the  clear  voice  of  the  gallant  Wayne,  '  On  to  the  fort.' 
Balls,  shells,  and  bullets  were  poured  down  upon  them,  but  they  pressed  on. 
As  they  were  scaling  the  fort,  Wayne  fell,  shot  in  the  head  ;  but  he  had  time 
still  to  cry — '  On,  my  brave  men — carry  me  to  the  fort,  for  I  will  die  at  the 
head  of  my  column.'  They  bore  him  into  the  fort,  where,  still  bleeding,  he 
gave  his  orders  till  the  garrison  surrendered,  when  he  was  laid  senseless  on 
the  ground.  But  the  wound  not  being  mortal,  he  soon  revived,  and  calling  for 
a  sheet  of  paper,  he  wrote  and  instantly  despatched  the  following  words  to 
Washington  :  '  The  fort  and  garrison,  with  Col.  Johnson,  are  ours.  Our  offi- 
cers and  men  behaved  like  men  who  are  determined  to  be  free.'  2 

The  achievement  elicited  the  warmest  praises  from  Washington,  and  the 
affair  at  Stony  Point  has  always  been  regarded  as  one  of  the  most  brilliant  of 
the  war.     But  Washington  was  too  short  of  men  to  hold  the  place  as  a  garri- 

1  In  proposing  this  to  Wayne— the  only  man  in  the  lish,  they  did  not  kill  a  single  man  after  he  had  asked 

army  he  would  choose  for  so  desperate  an  enterprise —  for  quarter.     Eulpgiums  came  pouring  in  upon  from 

he  asked  him  if  he  would  undertake  it — '  General,'  was  every  direction.     .     .     . 
the  reply,  '  it  you  will  only  plan  it,  I  will  storm  h— 11/  His  was  one  of  those  stormy  natures  that  delight 

a  Wayne's  wound  proved  not  to  be  severe — the  ball  in  dangers,  and  find  their  appropriate  life  in  scenes  of 

having  only  grazed  the  skull  for  two  inches,  and  he  great  action  and  excitement     This  perhaps  amounted 

lived  to  wear  the  laurels  a  grateful  nation  placed  on  his  to  a  fault  in  him,  for,  Caesar-like,  he  could  never  refuse 

brow.    The  country  rung  with  his  name,  and  Congress  an  offered  battle,  whatever  the  terms  might  be.     He 

presented  him  with  a  gold  medal.     The  whole  plan  of  seemed  to  look  upon  it  as  a  privilege  he  might  not  soon 

the  assault  was  most  skillfully  laid,  and  the  bearing  of  enjoy  again,  and  hence  was  inclined  to  take  the  best 

Wayne  throughout  gallant  in  the  extreme.     He  chose  advantage  of  it  he  could  ;  still,  there  was  nothing  fero- 

the  post  of  danger  at  the  head  of  his  column,  and  led  cious  in  his  character,  and  none  of  those  sordid  quali- 

his  men  where  even  the  bravest  might  shrink  to  follow,  ties  which  so  often  dim  the  lustre  of  a  great  warrior, 

and  when  struck  and  apparently  dying,  heroically  de-  Generous,  frank,  and  cordial,  he  loved  two  things  su- 

manded  to  be  carried  forward,  that  he  might  die  in  the  premely — his  country  and  glory.     For  these  he  would 

;»rms  of  victory,  or  be  left   where   the  last  stand  was  undergo  any  toil,  submit  to  any  privation,  and  risk  any 

made.     His  iroops  were  worthy  of  such  a  leader,  and  death.     He  fought  nobly,  maintained  nis  honor  untar- 

more  gallant  otficeii  never  led  men  into  batde.     Their  nished  to  the  last,  and  stands  in  the  front  rank  of  thi 

humanity  was  equal  to  their  bravery,  for  notwithstand-  defenders  of  their  country. — J.  T.  Headley's  Wash 

pg  the  barbarous  massacres,  perpetrated  by  the  Eag-  ington  and  his  Generals,  pp.  328,  340. 


396  CLINTON'S  BARBARITY  IN  THE  SOUTH. 

son.     The  artillery  and  military  stores  were  removed,  and  the  fort  was  dis 
mantled  and  left  to  the  foe.1 

Clinton's  barbarous  Policy  of  Butchery,  Pillage,  and  Burning. — Unsuc- 
cessful in  the  chief  objects  of  the  campaign  of  this  year,  the  British  command- 
ers cast  aside  the  chief  reliances  of  fair  and  open  warfare,  and  limited  theii 
efforts  to  the  most  barbarous  depredations,  and  the  most  atrocious  butcheries. 
Gov.  Tryon  had  been  sent  to  lay  waste  Connecticut.  Clinton  knew  that  the 
man  of  his  choice  would  hesitate  at  no  act  of  inhumanity  or  blood.  All  the 
shipping  of  New  Haven  was  destroyed.  Fairfield,  Norwalk,  and  Greenwich 
were  pillaged,  and  then  burned.  Free  license  was  given  by  Tryon  to  his 
men,  for  indiscriminate  robbery,  and  unbridled  licentiousness.  For  many 
days  after  these  scenes  of  atrocity,  females  half  frantic  with  fright  and  famine, 
were  found  wandering  about  the  marshes  and  swamps  of  the  neighborhood. 

Washington  did  all  that  he  could,  in  the  meantime ;  for  he  not  only  acted 
on  the  defensive  far  enough  to  protect  every  place  within  his  reach,  but  he 
made  some  bold  aggressions  which  resulted  in  brilliant  successes.  Gen.  Sullivan 
was  sent  with  three  thousand  men  to  the  valley  of  Wyoming,  to  chastise  the 
Indians  for  their  savage  butcheries.  Being  reinforced  by  sixteen  hundred 
men  under  James  Clinton  of  New  York,  forty  Indian  villages  were  burned, 
and  the  Indians  and  royalists  were  signally  defeated,  and  put  to  flight,  with 
Johnson,  Butler,  and  Brant,  their  ferocious  leaders. 

D'Estaing' s  Fleet  appears  on  the  Southern  Coast. — As  the  English  were 
now  more  firmly  resolved  than  ever  on  conquering  the  South,  Washington 
requested  Count  d'Estaing  to  sail  immediately  with  his  fleet  from  the  British 
West  Indies,  to  act  in  conjunction  with  the  American  forces  in  the  South,  for 
the  campaign  of  '79-80.  On  the  first  of  September  he  appeared  off  the  coast 
of  Georgia,  where  he  captured  three  frigates,  and  a  fifty-gun  ship  from  the 
British.  For  five  days  the  French  admiral  bombarded  Savannah,  but  with 
little  effect. 

Gallant  Assault  of  the  Allies  on  Savannah. — Gen.  Lincoln  and  Count 
d'Estaing  now  determined,  with  the  combined  French  and  American  forces, 
to  carry  the  town  by  assault.  The  French  were  led  in  three  columns,  and  the 
Americans  in  one.  The  brave  d'Estaing,  with  a  body  of  chivalrous  men, 
marched  at  their  head.  They  made  a  terrible  and  deadly  onslaught ;  but  the 
bravest  of  the  leaders  were  borne  wounded  from  the  field.  At  this  moment  of 
misfortune  and  repulse,  Count  Pulaski  a  came  up  with  two  hundred  horsemen 

1  The  British  lost,  in  killed,  wounded,  and  prison-  '  determined,'  says  the  author  of  his  life,  in  Appleton's 
ers,  about  six  hundred  men  ;  the  loss  of  the  Americans  Cyclopeedia,  '  to  join  the  Americans,  and  with  high  re- 
was  fifteen  killed,  and  eighty-three  wounded.  The  commendations  from  Franklin  to  Washington,  ar- 
spoiis  were  a  large  amount  of  military  stores.  The  rived  in  Philadelphia  in  the  summer  of  1777.  He  at 
post  w»s  abandoned  by  the  Americans,  for,  at  that  time,  first  served  in  the  army  as  a  volunteer  ;  but  four  days 
troops  sufficient  to  garrison  it  could  not  be  spared. —  after  the  battle  of  the  Brandywine,  in  which  he  dis- 
Lossing^s  U.  S.%  p.  298.  tinguished   himself,  he  was    appointed,   by   Congress, 

3  This  noble  Polish  patriot,  who  had  fought  so  gal-  commander  of  the  cavalry,  with  the  rank  of  brigadier- 

lantly  in  behalf  of  his  native  country,  and  after  many  general.     After  five  months  at  the  head  of  this  body, 

lud  wild  adventures,  finally  taken  refuge  in  France,  he  resigned  his  command,  and  entered  the  main  army 


FORTUNE  FAVORS  US  ON  THE  SEA. 


397 


to  renew  the  charge  ;  but  he  was  soon  mortally  wounded.  Undismayed,  the 
Americans  pressed  their  attack  with  the  most  determined  bravery  from  all 
sides.  The  gallant  Laurens,  who  always  distinguished  himself,  was  in  the 
thickest  of  the  battle ;  but  cut  to  pieces,  and  seeing  that  victory  could  not 
be  won,  his  column  staggered,  and  reeled  back.  His  biographer  says  that 
he  flung  away  his  sword,  and,  his  noble  soul  wrung  with  anguish,  he  stretched 
forth  his  hands,  and  prayed  for  death.  He  refused  to  stir,  till  he  was  forced 
away  by  his  companions.  Near  him  lay  the  body  of  the  brave  sergeant 
Jasper,  who  had  planted  upon  Fort  Moultrie  the  fallen  standard  of  his 
country,  now  grasping  in  death  the  colors  presented  to  his  regiment  for 
his  heroic  deeds  at  Charleston.  This  serious  reverse,  which  sprang  from  this 
over-confident  heroism  and  impatience  of  d'Estaing,  cost  the  Americans  more 
than  five  hundred  men. 

Fortune  favors  us  on  the  Sea. — With  the  aid  of  France,  a  little  navy  ' 
had  been  fitted  out,  consisting  of  three  frigates,  and  two  smaller  vessels, 
which  were  put  under  the  command  of  Paul  Jones.  This  intrepid  man  was 
born  in  Scotland  ;  but  his  heart  was  with  the  American  Colonies  in  their 
struggle  for  freedom.  With  the  deepest  earnestness  he  espoused  our  cause, 
called  himself  an  American,  and  fought  at  all  times  with  the  greatest  gallantry, 


at  Valley  Forge  in  March,  1778.  There  he  proposed  to 
organize  an  independent  corps,  consisting  of  cavalry, 
lancers,  and  light  infantry,  and  this  proposal  was  ac- 
cepted by  Congress,  who  empowered  him  to  raise  and 
equip  such  a  body  of  men  to  the  number  of  two  hundred 
and  sixty-eight,  and,  if  the  experiment  were  successful, 
to  a  s till  larger  number.  By  October  three  hundred 
and  thirty  men  were  in  this  corps,  which  was  called 
Pulaski's  legion.  With  this  he  marched,  in  the  begin- 
ning of  February,  1779,  to  South  Carolina  to  put  him- 
self under  the  orders  of  Gen.  Lincoln,  then  commanding 
the  Department  of  the  South.  He  reached  Charleston 
May  8,  and  while  there  vigorously  opposed  the  project 
entertained  by  the  governor  and  council  of  surrendering 
the  place  to  the  British  army,  then  before  the  city. 

In  September,  the  French,  under  Count  d'Estaing 
and  the  Americans,  prepared  to  besiege  Savannah,  and 
during  the  march  to  Georgia,  Pulaski's  legion  did  ef- 
fectual service  in  reconnoitering.  When  near  Savannah 
he  heard  of  the  landing  of  the  French  general,  and  re- 
ceived from  him  a  complimentary  letter,  in  which  he 
said  that,  '  knowing  Count  Pulaski  was  there,  he  was 
sure  he  would  be  the  first  to  join  him.'  The  two 
armies  united  on  September  16,  and,  on  October  9,  it 
was  determined  to  carry  the  town  by  assault.  Pulaski 
was  placed  at  the  head  of  the  French  and  American 
cavalry,  and  during  the  engagement  received  a  mortal 
wound.  He  was  taken  on  board  the  United  States 
biig  VVasf>,  which  lay  in  the  Savannah  River,  died 
after  lingering  two  days,  and  was  buried  in  the  river. 
A  monument  to  his  memory,  voted  by  Congress,  has 
never  been  erected  ;  but  one  was  raised  by  the  citizens 
of  Georgia  in  Savannah,  of  which  Lafayette,  during  his 
triumphal  progress  through  the  United  States,  laid  the 
corner-stone. — Appleton's  Cyclopaedia,  p.  655. 

1  The  naval  operations  during  the  war  for  inde- 
pendence, do  not  occupy  a  conspicuous  place  in  history, 
yet  they  were  by  no  means  insignificant.  The  Con- 
tinental Congress  took  action  on  the  subject  of  an 
armed  marine,  in  the  autumn  of  1775.  Already  Wash- 
ington had  fitted  out  some  armed  vessels  at  Boston,  and 
constructed  some  gunboats  for  use  in  the  waters  around 
that  city.  These  were  propelled  by  oars,  and  covered. 
In  November,  the  government  of  Massachusetts  estab- 
lished a  Board  of  Admiralty.  A  committee  on  naval 
tflairs,  of  which  Silai  Deane  was  chairman,  was  ap- 


pointed by  the  Continental  Congress  in  October,  1775. 
Before  the  close  of  the  year,  the  construction  of  almost 
twenty  vessels  had  been  ordered  by  Congress  ;  and 
the  Marine  Committee  was  so  reorganized  as  to  have 
in  it  a  representative  from  each  colony.  In  November, 
1776,  a  Continental  Navy  Board,  to  assist  the 
Marine  Committee,  was  appointed  ;  and  in  October, 
1779,  a  Board  0/  Admiralty  was  installed.  Its 
secretary  (equivalent  to  our  Secretary  of  the  Navy)  was 
John  Brown,  until  1771,  when  he  was  succeeded  by 
General  McDougal.  Robert  Morris  also  acted  as 
authorized  Agent  of  Marine;  and  many  privateers 
were  fitted  out  by  him  on  his  own  account.  In  No- 
vember, 1776,  Congress  determined  the  relative  rank 
of  the  naval  commanders,  such  as  admiral  to  be  equal 
to  a  major-general  on  land  ;  a  commodore  equal  to 
brigadier-general,  etc.  The  first  commander-in-chief 
of  the  navy,  or  high  admiral,  was  Esek  Hopkins,  of 
Rhode  Island,  whom  Congress  commissioned  as  such 
in  December,  1775.  He  first  went  against  Dunmore, 
on  the  coast  of  Virginia.  He  also  went  to  the  Bahamas, 
and  captured  the  town  of  New  Providence  and  its 
governor.  Sailing  for  home,  he  captured  some  British 
vessels  off  the  east  end  of  Long  Island,  and,  with  these 
prizes,  he  went  into  Narraganset  Bay.  In  the  mean- 
while, Paul  Jones  and  Captain  Barry  were  doing  good 
service,  and  New  England  cruisers  weie  greatly  an 
noying  English  shipping  on  our  coast.  In  1777,  Dr 
Franklin,  under  the  authority  of  Congress,  issued  com- 
missions to  naval  officers  in  Europe.  Expeditions 
were  fitted  out  in  French  sea-ports,  and  these  produced 
great  alarm  on  the  British  coasts. 

While  these  things  were  occurring  in  European 
waters,  Captains  Biddle,  Manly,  McNeil,  Hinman, 
Barry,  and  others,  were  making  many  prizes  on  the 
American  coasts.  Many  other  gallant  acts  were  per- 
formed by  American  seamen,  in  the  regular  service, 
and  as  privateers,  during  the  remainder  of  the  war. 
The  whaleboat  warfare  on  the  coast  was  also  very  in- 
teresting, and  exhibited  many  a  brave  deed  by  those 
whose  names  are  not  recorded  in  history—men  who  be- 
long to  the  great  host  of  unnamed  demigods,  who,  in 
all  ages,  have  given  their  service  to  :swell  the  tri- 
umphs of  leaders,  who  in  real  merit  have  often  b:so 
less  deserving  than  themselves. — Lossing's  Hist.  17. 
.V.,  pp.  307,  308. 


398  BRILLIANT  DEEDS  OF  PAUL  JONES. 

and  frequently  with  an  energy  almost  without  parallel  in  the  history  of  naval 

daring. 

« 

Brilliant  Achievements  of  Paul  Jones. — While  searching  for  vessels  on 
the  coast  of  Scotland,  he  sailed  to  intercept  a  merchant  fleet  of  forty  vessels 
coming  from  the  Baltic,  under  the  convoy  of  the  British  frigates  Serapis,  and 
the  Countess  of  Scarborough.  The  merchant  fleet  separated  in  two  divisions, 
while  the  British  commander  bore  down  for  an  immediate  engagement.  The 
action  began  in  the  evening,  off  the  Scotch  coast,  within  sight  of  several 
thousand  spectators.  Finding  that  the  Englishman  had  an  advantage  m 
weight  of  metal,  Jones  early  gave  orders  to  close  in,  and  lash  his  ships  to 
the  enemy's.  His  orders  were  instantly  obeyed.  The  muzzles  of  the  hostile 
guns  touched — the  sides  were  mounted,  and  desperate  men  began  to  butcher 
each  other  with  cutlasses.  While  this  slaughter  was  going  on,  Jones  found 
that  his  flag-ship  Bon  Homme  Richard,  which  had  seen  long  service,  was 
nearly  disabled,  and  he  was  obliged  to  leave  her.  He  cut  short  the  work, — 
he  fired  grenades,  which  several  times  set  the  Serapis  on  fire — and  the  action 
went  on.  Magazines  of  powder  exploded.  The  British  vessels  were  on  fire. 
The  darkness  and  the  smoke  were  pierced  by  screams  of  distress,  and  shouts 
of  heroism.  At  last,  when  the  carnage  had  become  almost  a  massacre,  the 
British  commander — Pearson — struck  his  colors,  and  surrendered.  Many  of* 
the  marine  vessels  fell  into  Jones's  hands.  His  prizes  were  estimated  at  two 
or  three  hundred  thousand  dollars.  The  French  king  conferred  on  him  the 
Order  of  Merit.  Congress  voted  him  its  thanks,  and  presented  him  with  a 
gold  medal  in  honor  of  the  victory.1 

Hopeless  State  of  American  Finances. — Congress,  as  we  have  before 
lamented,  had  small  and  feeble  means  for  the  prosecution  of  this  great  war.  It 
could  not  redeem  its  own  bills,  and  it  was  obliged  to  annul  the  restriction 
which  prohibited  the  government  from  parting  with  them  except  at  par ;  for 

1  In  1792  he  was  taken  sick  at  Paris,  and  gradually  after  peace  was  proclaimed  in  the  United  States.  It 
declined.  He  had  been  making  strenuous  efforts  in  was  this  alone  that  carried  him  from  his  low  condition, 
behalf  of  the  American  prisoners  in  Algiers,  but  never  through  so  many  trials,  and  over  so  many  obstacles, 
lived  to  see  his  benevolent  plans  carried  out.  On  the  to  the  height  of  fame  he  at  last  reached. 
18th  of  July,  1792,  he  made  his  will,  and  his  friends,  He  was  not  a  mere  adventurer — owing  his  elevation 
after  witnessing  it.  bade  him  good  evening  and  de-  to  headlong  daring — he  was  a  hard  student  as  well  as 
parted.  His  physician  coming  soon  after,  perceived  a  hard  fighter,  and  had  a  strong  intellect  as  well  as  a 
his  chair  vacant ;  and,  going  to  his  bed,  found  him  strong  arm.  He  wrote  with  astonishing  fluency,  con- 
stretched  upon  it,  dead.  A  few  days  after,  a  despatch  sidering  the  .neglect  of  his  early  education.  He  even 
was  received  from  the  United  States,  appointing  him  wrote  eloquently  at  times,  and  always  with  force.  His 
commissioner  to  treat  with  Algiers  for  the  ransom  of  words  were  well  chosen,  and  he  was  as  able  to  defend 
the  American  prisoners  in  captivity  there.  The  Na-  himself  with  the  pen  as  with  the  sword.  He  now  and 
tional  Assembly  of  France  decreed  that  twelve  of  its  then  indulged  in  poetic  effusions,  especially  in  his 
members  should  assist  at  the  funeral  ceremonies  of  epistles  to  the  ladies  ;  and  his  verses  were  as  good  as 
'  Admiral  Paul  Jones,'  and  a  eulogium  was  pronounced  the  general  run  of  poetry  of  that  kind, 
over  his  tomb.  Paul  Jones  was  an  irregular  character,  but  his  good 
Thus  died  Paul  Jones,  at  the  age  of  forty-five,  leaving  qualities  predominated  over  his  bad  ones;  and  as  the 
a  name  that  shall  live  as  long  as  the  American  Navy  man  who  first  hoisted  the  American  flag  at  sea  ;  and 
rides  the  sea received  the  first  salute  offered  it  by  a  foreign  nation  . 

He  was  a  restless  being,  and  his  brain  constantly  and  the  first  who  carried  it  victoriously  through  the 

teemed  with  schemes,  all  of  which  he  deemed  practica-  fight  on  the  waves,  he  deserves  our  highest  praise,  and 

ble,  and  therefore  became  querulous  and  fuult-finding  most  grateful  remembrance. 

when  others  disagreed  with  him.     Man}  of 'his  plans  With  such  a  commander  to  lead  the  American  navy, 

for  the  improvement  of  our  marine  were  excellent.     His  and  stand  before  it  as  the  model  of  a  brave  man,  ii.1 

resdessness  grew  out  of  his  amazing  energy — he  was  wonder  it  has  covered  itself  with  glory. —  Washi?igton 

ever  seeking  something  on  which  to  expend  himself,  and  his  Generals,  by  Headley,  pp.  355-356. 
and  this  *  as  the  reason  he  joined  the  Russian  service, 


DARKLING  CLOSE  OF  1779.  399 

the  Continental  money  had  fallen  so  low,  it  was  with  difficulty  that  one 
hundred  dollars  of  the  bills  could  command  three  dollars  in  specie.  One  of 
the  chief  causes  for  this  complete  prostration  of  the  public  credit,  was  that  the 
British  government  had  unscrupulously  turned  counterfeiter ;  for  Continental 
money  was  manufactured  in  England  to  the  extent  of  millions,  and  scattered 
broadcast  through  the  Colonies.  This  was  done  by  the  British  government, 
which  was  every  month  hanging  private  individuals  for  the  same  crime  against 
her  own  currency. 

It  has  been  well  said  that — '  Bad  money  makes  bad  men.'  These,  how- 
ever, were  not  the  only  evils  attending  the  prostration  of  the  credit  of  the 
impoverished  government  of  the  Colonies.  Some  of  these  consequences  not 
only  fell  upon  the  head  of  Washington  direct,  but  they  furnished  bad  and 
selfish  men  with  pretexts  for  cabals,  seditions,  and  intrigues  against  that  great 
and  good  man.  The  most  malicious  rumors,  and  atrocious  calumnies  were 
perpetrated  and  scattered  against  his  fair  name.  They  had  their  effect  for  a 
time ;  but  every  man  engaged  in  them  was  compelled,  sooner  or  later,  to 
confess  what  the  near  prospect  of  death  had  extorted  from  Gen.  Conway. 

Close  of  the  Campaign  of  177 9. — When  it  ended,  Washington  retired  to  his 
winter  quarters  at  Morristown.  With  all  the  desperate  fighting  of  that  year, 
nothing  definite  had  been  achieved.  The  fortunes  of  war  had  not  yet  decided 
for  the  Republicans,  and  to  very  many  it  seemed  that  in  the  midst  of  universal 
destitution,  and  the  decimated  forces  left  to  prosecute  the  war,  an  ultimate 
triumph  could  hardly  be  hoped  for.  In  the  meantime  the  resources  of  the 
British  commanders  were  being  multiplied  every  hour,  and  streams  of  wealth 
were  flowing  in  at  their  command  from  the  strong  government  of  England. 
Parliament  voted  to  send  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  men  to  America, 
and  appropriated  fifty  million  dollars  to  carry  on  the  war.  France  had 
proved  to  be  a  very  uncertain  and  inefficient  ally.  The  councils  of  Congress 
had  at  last  grown  discordant,  and  the  only  point  which  either  we  or  the  world 
thought  impregnable — the  unanimity  of  the  national  councils — threatened  to 
give  way.  In  the  bitterness  of  his  soul,  Washington  said,  in  one  of  his  letters, 
that  '  it  seems  as  though  friends  and  foes  are  combining  to  pull  down  the  fabric 
they  have  been  raising,  at  the  expense  of  so  much  time,  blood  and  treasure.' 

Sir  Henry  Clinton  sails  from  New  York  with  Seven  Thousand  Men — De- 
cember, 1 779.— Charleston  was  bravely  defended  ;  but  after  a  series  of  disasters 
to  our  forces,  General  Lincoln  was  compelled  to  surrender  his  army,  consist- 
ing of  seven  officers,  ten  provincial  regiments,  and  three  battalions,  May 
1 2th.  The  surrender  also  cost  our  cause  four  hundred  pieces  of  artillery, 
and  four  frigates.  Colonel  Tarleton,  a  man  gifted  with  uncommon  military 
genius,  but  disgraced  by  unmitigated  cruelty,  had  under  his  command  a  body 
of  trained  cavalry  that  he  moved  with  more  celerity  and  adroitness  tnan  any 
other  commanders  on  either  side,  during  the  Revolution.  He  met  a  corps  of 
South  Carol'na  patriots  under  Colonel  Buford,  at  Warsaw,  overcame  them 


400  THE  HORIZON  BEGINS  TO  BRIGHTEN. 

in  battle,  and  massacred  the  men  after  they  had  laid  down  arr.s,  and  were 
crying  for  quarter.  Corps  of  royalists  and  Tories  were  organized  in  various 
portions  of  the  State,  and  so  complete  was  the  supremacy  of  the  British 
arms,  that  at  one  time  it  seemed  as  if  South  Carolina  itself  had  gone  over 
<.o  the  king.  Sir  Henry  Clinton  wrote  to  the  home  government  that 
1  South  Carolina  was  English  again.'  After  garrisoning  his  army  at  strong 
points  through  the  South,  he  left  the  command  to  Lord  Corwallis,  and  sailed 
for  New  York.  More  injury  would  have  been  done  to  our  arms,  had  not  the 
British  commander  affixed  a  condition  to  the  pardon  extended  to  all  rebels, 
— requiring  them  not  only  to  abandon  the  patriot  cause,  but  to  take  up  arms 
and  aid  the  British.  There  was  a  general  exclamation  that,  if  inoffensive  and 
peaceable  citizens  could  not  enjoy  the  royal  clemency  without  going  to  the 
field,  they  might  as  well  fight  for  their  own  country,  as  for  foreign  oppressors. 
A  spirit  of  resentment  and  hostility  against  England  was  inflamed  by  this 
circumstance,  and  the  patriotism  of  the  South  was  encouraged  by  the  conduct 
of  the  women  of  Carolina,  who  absented  themselves  from  every  scene  of 
festivity  common  to  the  social  habits  of  military  men,  after  successful  exploits. 
This  was  a  source  of  deep  mortification  to  the  British  officers,  and  some 
retaliations  were  made,  which  brave  men  should  never  have  been  mean 
enough  to  stoop  to.  In  Virginia,  the  conduct  of  high-born  and  refined  women 
was  equally  inspiring.  Martha — the  mother  of  Washington — encouraged  the 
formation  of  sewing  societies  to  make  clothing  for  the  troops,  and  presided 
over  those  scenes  of  chivalric  industry  herself.1 

The  Horizo?i  of  American  Lidependence  begins  to  brighten. — New  light 
broke  in  from  unexpected  quarters.  Lafayette,  who  had  returned  to  France 
for  a  brief  visit,  once  more  landed  on  our  shores,  bringing  with  him  the  glad 
news  that  six  thousand  French  soldiers  had  already  embarked  to  aid  our 
cause  ;  and  shortly  after,  Count  Rochambeau,  who  commanded  the  expedition, 
landed  on  our  coast.  The  French  government  had  also  courteously  con- 
sented to  have  all  the  French  forces  placed  under  the  supreme  command  of 
Washington,  who  ordered  the  French  colors  to  be  blended  with  those  of  the 
Colonies  on  the  banners  of  the  army.  All  these  circumstances  conspired  to 
raise  the  drooping  spirits  of  the  disheartened  Republican  soldiers ;  and  the 
most  vigorous  resolutions  prevailed  in  the  National  Congress,  and  the 
Councils  of  War.  Men  rushed '  from  every  quarter  to  join  the  army  which 
was  advancing  under  General  Gates,  to  South  Carolina,  to  relieve  its  dis- 
tressed inhabitants.  While  his  four  thousand  Northerners  were  hastening  to 
the  scene  of  the  next  struggle,  Sumpter  and  Marion — two  of  the  immortal 
names  which  graced  the  chivalry  of  freedom — became  illustrious  by  successful 
engagements  with  the  public  enemy.  These  skirmishers  furnished  the  desti- 
tute followers  of  Marion  and  Sumpter  with  ammunition  and  materials  of  war, 
of  which  they  were  destitute  ;  and  signal  services  were  rendered  to  the 
popular  cause  by  these  dauntless  chieftains. 

1  If  the  reader  feels  that  I  should  pause  a  while  to    let  him  wait  till  we  get  rid  of  these  clumsy  fighters,  an  4 
pay  at  least  a  worthier  tribute  to  this  sublime  woman,     we  wiil  come  to  the  heroic  women  of  America. 


TREASON  OF  BENEDICT  ARNOLD.  401 

The  British  division,  under  the  command  of  Lord  Rawdor,  in  Carolina, 
had  formed  a  junction  with  the  division  under  Cornwallis  at  Camden,  where, 
August  15th,  a  bloody  engagement  took  place,  ending  in  the  death  of 
General  Gregory,  the  fall  of  Baron  de  Kalb,  who  was  mortally  wounded,  and- 
the  retreat  of  our  army,  with  the  loss  of  2,000  men  in  killed,  wounded,  or 
prisoners,  with  all  the  stores,  artillery,  and  baggage.  Gen.  Gates  retreated 
to  North  Carolina,  which  left  the  South  once  more  in  the  possession  of  the 
enemy.  It  was  reserved  to  Greene  to  redeem  the  disasters  of  this  unfortu- 
nate commander. 

The  Treason  of  Be?iedict  Arnold,  September,  1 780. — The  scrolls  of  the 
long  war  for  Independence,  were  blackened  by  the  name  of  only  a  single 
traitor.  It  should,  therefore,  be  dwelt  upon  with  more  minuteness  than 
the  tenor  of  our  recital  would  otherwise  admit.  That  dark  and  terrible  con- 
spiracy, which,  if  successful,  would  doubtless  have  resulted  in  the  most 
terrible  consequences  to  the  cause  of  Independence,  has  made  West  Point 
and  the  shores  of  the  Hudson  the  enchanted  ground  of  the  Revolution  ;  and 
it  may  worthily  find  a  place  in  any  record  of  those  dark  days.  Involved  by 
habits  of  prodigality  in  heavy  debt,  willing  to  gratify  the  ambition  of  a  gay 
and  beautiful  wife,  and  failing  in  every  other  attempt  to  extricate  himself, 
Arnold  at  last  resolved  to  betray  the  patriotic  Cause,  and  entered  into 
negoliations  with  the  enemy  for  that  purpose.  He  had  fixed  his  price  high, 
and  he  was  a  man  to  render  a  full  equivalent  for  his  services.  By  adroit 
management,  he  succeeded  in  getting  the  command  of  West  Point,  the 
strongest  fortress  in  the  possession  of  the  Colonial  army ;  and  as  soon  as  the 
terms  were  settled,  he  was  to  deliver  up  to  the  enemy  this  Gibraltar  of 
American  liberty.  If  at  that  time,  the  British  commander  who  had  control 
of  the  City  of  New  York,  could  have  passed  the  only  barrier  that  lay  between 
him  and  the  British  forces  in  Canada,  England  might,  have  recovered  from 
some  of  the  disasters  which  had  followed  the  surrender  of  Burgoyne  three 
years  before.  The  hour  at  last  came  when  the  traitor,  who  had  been  eigh- 
teen months  maturing  his  infernal  purpose,  was  to  betray  his  country. 

He  was  a  bold  traitor,  for  he  was  consummating  his  work  in  the  very 
presence  of  Washington,  who  was  crossing  the  North  River  to  meet  Count 
Rochambeau  at  Hartford.  Arnold  went  in  his  barge  from  West  Point  to 
King's  Ferry,  to  escort  the  Commander-in-Chief  over  the  river.  It  was  the 
1 8th  of  September.  As  the  barge  got  under  way,  Washington  raised  his 
field-glass  to  the  British  frigate  Vulture,  which  was  lying  in  full  view,  six 
miles  down  the  river.  After  looking  for  some  time  steadily,  he  spoke  in  a 
low  tone  to  one  of  his  officers  sitting  by  his  side.  The  adder  in  Arnold's 
bosom  started  !  Another  curious  incident  occurred.  About  that  time  the 
squadron  of  Admiral  Count  de  Giuchen  was  expected  on  the  coast.  In  a 
tone  of  pleasantry,  Lafayette  said  to  Arnold,  'General,  since  yci  have  a 
correspondence  with  the  enemy,' — alluding  to  the  intercourse  between  West 
Point,  where  Arnold  commanded,  and  New  York,  by  means  of  the  river — 
-6 


402  MEETING  OF  ARNOLD  AND  ANDR&. 

you  must  ascertain  as  soon  as  you  can,  what  has  become  of  De  Giuchen. 
Arnold,  more  than  half  thrown  off  his  guard,  quickly  demanded,  *  What  do 
you  mean,  General?'  A  moment  more,  and  the  Argus-eye  of  the  Chief 
might  have  detected  the  conspiracy,  for  Washington  never  had  full  confidence 
in  Arnold,  except  in  his  bravery.  But  destiny  was  working  out  the  plot,  and 
it  had  to  go  on.  The  boat  struck  the  shore,  and  the  Commander-in-chief 
stepped  off. 

Arnold  attended  the  party  to  Peekskill,  where  they  all  passed  the  night. 
Early  the  next  morning  Washington  went  on  to  Hartford,  after  parting  with 
the  traitor,  who  watched  his  form  disappearing  behind  a  turn  in  the  road. 
He  breathed  free  for  the  first  time  in  twenty-four  hours.  He  must  have  felt 
as  Satan  did  when  the  Guardian  Angel  left  the  Garden  of  Eden,  and  our 
first  parents  went  to  their  fatal  repose. 

Meeting  of  Arnold  and  Andre  at  Haverstraw — Sept.  22. — He  had  ar- 
ranged his  meeting  with  Andre — a  gallant  and  gentle  name,  which  suggests  to 
our  minds  whatever  is  noble  in  heroism,  beautiful  in  art,  and  touching  in 
suffering.  This  brave  and  gifted  young  officer,  one  of  the  most  generous  of 
all  his  countrymen  whose  fate  it  was  to  mingle  in  that  inglorious  crusade 
against  freedom,  had  set  out  from  New  York  on  the  morning  of  the  20th, 
and  reached  the  Vulture  at  seven  the  same  evening.  Arnold  was  to  have 
gone  on  board  the  English  man-of-war ;  but  at  the  last  moment — if  not 
before — he  resolved  not  to  trust  himself  in  the  hands  of  his  friends.  He  had 
therefore  required  that  the  meeting  should  take  place  on  shore,  where 
Andre  was  to  go.  There  was  an  American,  Joshua  H.  Smith,  living  on  the 
western  bank  of  the  Hudson,  who  became — what  charity  allows  us  to  believe 
— the  unconscious  instrument  of  Arnold's  treason.  Smith's  dwelling  was  the 
place  where  the  final  scene  of  this  villainy  was  enacted.  Only  two  days 
before  Washington  crossed  the  river,  Mrs.  Arnold  had  passed  the  night  there, 
and  Arnold  had  gone  down  to  meet  her.  She  was  doubtless  ignorant  of  the 
cowardly  plot  of  her  husband ;  nor  did  the  sight  of  this  beautiful  young 
mother  with  her  tender  babe,  whom  he  was  to  cover  with  dishonor,  shake  his 
purpose.  During  this  visit,  he  persuaded  Smith,  under  various  patriotic 
pretexts,  to  allow  the  interview  between  himself  and  Major  Andre,  to  take 
place  at  his  house.     The  family  had  to  be  removed, — they  were. 

Night  came,  and  Arnold  was  on  the  spot.  He  sent  Smith  off  with  two 
oarsmen — the  Colquhoun  brothers — who  were  induced  to  go  only  by  the 
threats  and  promises  of  Arnold.  They  were  fired  into  by  the  guard-boats  from 
shore,  and  had  to  put  back.  Andre  passed  an  anxious  night  on  the  Vulture 
waiting  for  Arnold,  or  his  messenger.  In  the  morning  a  flag  of  truce  came 
oft',  and  definite  arrangements  were  made  for  Andre  to  be  taken  on  shore  thai 
night.  To  remove  all  difficulty  in  passing  the  American  guard-boats,  the 
countersign  Congress  had  been  fixed  on.  When  Smith  and  the  boatman 
reached  the  landing  where  their  boat  lay,  the  oars  were  muffled  by  Arnold's 
direction. 


POIXr,    ON   TUB   HCDSON,    NEW   XORJE^ 


TREASON  PL  O  TTED  A  T  MIDNIGHT.  403 

It  was  a  serene  night — too  calm  for  the  drama  being  played.  There  was 
no  ripple  on  the  bosom  of  the  Hudson ;  the  boat  swept  noiselessly  over 
the  lake-like  river,  very  wide  in  that  part,  and  met  with  no  obstacle  till  it  wai 
hoarsely  hailed  from  the  dark  hulk  of  the  Vulture.  Thirty  minutes  after- 
wards,  the  commanding  form  of  a  young  Englishman  in  the  dashing  uniform 
of  an  adjutant-general — but  so  enveloped  with  a  blue  overcoat  that  no  portion 
of  his  military  dress  could  be  seen — passed  down  the  side  of  the  Vulture, 
and  the  mysterious  stranger  entered  the  boat,  while  the  brothers  Colquhoim 
dropped  their  muffled  oars  into  the  water.  The  entire  party  remained  silent, 
each  knowing  well  his  own  business,  no  one  knowing  his  neighbor's.  They 
landed  at  the  base  of  a  mountain  many  of  my  readers  have  seen,  on  the 
western  side  of  the  Hudson,  about  six  miles  from  Stony  Point,  called  Long 
Clove.  Arnold  had  reached  this  place,  with  one  of  Smith's  servants  for  a 
guide,  on  another  horse.  Smith  himself  came  up  the  bank,  groping  his  way, 
and  found  Arnold  hid  in  a  thicket  of  brush.  Descending  to  the  boat,  he  con- 
ducted Andre  back  to  the  spot.  They  met — the  willing  traitor,  and  the  un- 
willing spy — the  one,  '  cool  as  an  accustomed  devil,'  the  other  timid,  or 
apprehensive,  not  of  danger,  but  of  something  worse — dishonor. 

The  Night  Negotiations. — Hour  after  hour  passed  by — it  may  have  been 
fast  or  slow,  for  sometimes  neither  the  good  nor  the  bad  note  the  march  of 
time.  But  they  were  long  to  the  suspecting,  half-sick  man  who  waited  for 
this  strange  interview  to  end ;  he  could  wait  no  longer.  He  approached  the 
two  ;  they  started,  for  plotting  men  are  afraid  of  any  noise.  '  Only  I,'  said 
he  ;  '  but  the  night  is  nearly  gone.  Ye  will  look  badly  here  by  daylight,  me- 
thinks.'  Smith  told  his  boatmen  they  might  go  home.  The  terms  were  not 
yet  fully  settled  ;  and  daylight — that  unwelcome  visitor  to  all  dark  plotters — 
began  to  unfold  the  shores  of  the  Hudson.  Arnold  proposed  to  his  confidant 
to  ride  with  him  to  Smith's  house.  After  considerable  hesitation  he  assented. 
A  ride  of  a  few  miles  brought  them  to  the  American  lines,  and  through  the 
still  forest-darkness  was  heard  the  voice  of  the  sentinel  demanding  the 
countersign.  It  could  have  been  with  no  pleasant  feeling  that  the  British  spy 
found  himself  completely  in  the  power  of  a  traitor  to  his  country ;  for  he  who 
would  betray  his  native  land,  would  betray  a  foreign  enemy.  But  he  repelled 
the  chilling  apprehension ;  it  was  too  late  to  turn  back.  His  destiny  was 
fixed.  The  two  horsemen  rode  up  to  Smith's  house,  and  entered  it  just  as 
daylight  had  begun  to  fret  the  eastern  sky.  Here,  in  a  room  by  themselves — « 
without  even  the  possibility  of  a  listener — the  work  went  on. 

The  roar  of  heavy  cannon  was  suddenly  heard  coming  down  the  river, 
and  reverberating  among  the  rugged  hills.  Both  sprang  to  the  window ;  they 
looked  on  the  Hudson,  and  the  Vulture  seemed  in  flames.  As  they  fixed 
their  eyes  they  thought  they  saw  the  black  shot  of  Col.  Livingston's  guns  flying 
towards  the  ship,  and  her  own  towards  the  shore.  All  was  explained :  the 
Vulture  had  crept  up  too  far.  She  lifted  her  anchor  and  dropped  down  the 
river.     At  last  they  calmly  resumed  their  seats,  and  the  plot  moved  on. 


4°4  THE  UPPER  CHAMBER  ONE  A  UTUMN  DA  Y. 

Daylight  had  now  flooded  the  hills,  and  the  rising  autumn  sun  began  to 
roll  the  mist-clouds  off  from  the  bosom  of  the  river.  Smith  called  the  con- 
spirators to  breakfast.     He  ate  at  the  same  table.     They  talked  blindly as 

Arnold  had  for  months  carried  on  his  correspondence  with  the  enemy — under 
the  commercial  guise  of  bargain  and  sale.  Poor  Smith  wondered,  sus- 
pecting everything,  understanding  nothing. 

The  conspirators  are  again  in  the  upper  chamber,  and  once  more  -the  plot 
goes  on.  It  moves  slow,  for  Sir  Henry  Clinton  must  bid  high  for  treason  like 
Arnold's.  Was  he  not  an  American  general  ?  Was  he  not  made  commandant 
of  the  strongest  fortress  in  America, — that  almost  forlorn  hope  of  freedom — 
by  Washington  himself?  Was  he  not  yet  suffering  from  occasional  twinges  of 
pain  from  wounds  which  he  had  received  in  the  service  of  the  country  he 
was  now  betraying,  and  on  an  expedition  unparalleled  for  its  daring  ?  Was  he 
not  boldly  walking  to  the  gibbet  ?  Did  he  not  stare  eternal  infamy  in  the 
face,  and  look  it  down  ?  England  had  spent  generous  lives  enough  during 
five  years  of  fraternal  blood-shedding.  If  by  one  stroke,  she  could  now  reach 
the  goal  for  which  she  had  been  straining  nerve,  treasure  and  steel,  could  not 
England  pay  well  for  the  job?  Sir  Henry  Clinton  had  said  to  ministers  the 
plan  should  be  pursued  at  any  cost.  Arnold  wanted  money ;  and  he  could 
name  his  price.  He  wanted  honor,  after  disgrace  j  and  he  could  name  his 
future  military  rank.     He  did. 

What  passed  in  that  upper  chamber  all  through  that  calm  autumn  day  on 
the  magical  shores  of  the  Hudson — where  in  the  bland  September  month  na- 
ture blends  all  the  glories  of  ripened  summer  with  the  slowly  stealing  mosaic 
tintings  of  the  coming  autumn — we  can  never  conjecture.  Andre  died  too 
soon,  and  shame  closed  the  lips  of  the  traitor — and  thus  we  have  no  record 
left.  We  only  know  that  all  through  that  balmy  day, — more  bland  than  even 
September  Hudson  days  usually  are,  just,  it  would  seem,  to  show  the  con 
trast  between  pure,  truthful  nature,  and  foul,  lying  man, — there  sat  the  proud 
genial,  blushing  young  hero,  who  would  have  died  a  thousand  deaths  for  his 
king  and  country,  but  who  felt  that  fate  had  been  too  cruel  in  making  him 
play  the  part  he  was  now  acting.  With  a  heart  pure  enough  to  love  a  beauti- 
ful maiden  away  in  one  of  England's  dewy  homes,  who  treasured  his  memory, 
and  would  hide  her  blanched  face  in  her  hands  if  she  knew  what  her  lover 
was  then  doing,  away  on  the  wild  banks  of  that  beautiful  river; — and  in  trn 
same  chamber,  bending  across  a  table  covered  with  maps,  and  plans  of  Wes; 
Point,  and  writings  in  a  half-disguised  hand,  sat  the  seared  villain  who  had 
never  blushed  since  his  boyhood,  when  on  the  banks  of  that  other  fine  river 
that  courses  down  from  its  green  Connecticut  hills,  and  flows  by  Norwich,  he 
used  to  hunt  robin-redbreasts,  and  torture  their  young  to  see  the  gentle 
mother  flutter  round  the  murderer's  head,  and  utter  discordant  cries — suf- 
fering bird's  prayers  to  save  her  young  !  His  boyhood  days,  when  he  used  to 
gather  up  all  the  broken  phials  of  his  master's  drug-shop,  and  cast  them  on 
the  sidewalk,  to  see  poor  barefoot  boys  who  went  by,  cut  and  poison  their 
"eet  as  they  ran  on  with  light  hearts  to  school,  or  sport.      He   had  travelled 


THE  MISCARRIAGE  OF  THE  PLOT.  405 

far  on  the  road  of  life  covered  with  dust,  but  clothed  with  honor.  He  had 
gone  bravely  over  Canada  snows,  the  most  daring  of  the  brave — putting  ever 
old  campaign  valor  to  the  blush.  But  under  the  ices  of  the  North,  and 
through  the  smoke  of  battle,  and  in  the  shout  of  victory,  and  even  in  the 
presence  of  Washington,  he  had  carried  the  same  villain  heart  in  his  bosom  : 
and  he  now  thought  with  exulting  gladness  of  the  shriek  that  would  be  wrung 
from  the  bosom  of  Liberty  when  Freedom  expired — only  if  he  could  be  paid 
the  heavy  price  of  his  treason  ! ' 

There  are  some  scenes  it  is  well  for  us  not  to  witness  j  they  would  make 
almost  us  hate  the  sight  of  the  green  earth  itself.  What  a  picture  was  that — 
the  pale,  suffering  face  of  the  gallant  young  Andre,  blanched  and  recoiling 
from  the  demon  glare  of  Arnold  the  traitor ! 

The  Plot  is  finished. — Liberty  was  sold.  At  ten  o'clock  that  night,  if  one 
could  have  looked  into  that  room  he  would  have  seen  the  generous,  humili- 
ated Andre  concealing  in  his  stockings,  under  the  sole  of  his  feet,  several 
papers.  He  drew  on  his  boots  ;  he  had  the  death-warrant  of  American  liberty 
in  them,  and  he  wore  it  as  he  should — he  trod  on  it. 

Andre  must  now  return  to  New  York,  for  his  work  was  done.  How 
should  he  go  ?  Arnold  had  started  for  West  Point  in  his  barge ;  Smith  would 
not  take  Andre  back  to  the  Vulture :  there  was  no  other  way  but  by  land. 
Knowing  it  to  be  impossible  to  avoid  detection  in  his  military  dress,  he  ob- 
tained from  Smith  a  coat  in  exchange.  They  set  out,  crossing  the  river  at 
Verplanck's  Point. 

We  need  not  tell  the  rest  of  this  tale  :  every  reader  knows  that  he  fell  into 
the  hands  of  three  patriotic  men  who  loved  liberty  better  than  gold ;    that 

1  AndrPs  Capture. — It  happened  that  J6hn  Pauld-  gineer  on  the  attack  and  defence  of  the  place ;  return! 

ing,  a  poor  man,  then  about  forty-six  years  old,  a  zea-  of  garrison,  cannon,  and  stores,  all  in  the  handwriting 

lous  patriot  who  had  served  his  country  from  the  break-  of  Arnold.     'This  is  a  spy,'  said  Paulding.      Andre" 

ing  out  of  the  war,  and   had  twice  suffered  captivity,  offered  a  hundred  guineas,  any  sum  of  money,  if  they 

had  lately  escaped  from  New  York  and  had  formed  a  would  but  let  him  go.     'No,'  cried   Paulding,  'not  fo/ 

little  corps  of  partisans  to  annoy  roving  parties  taking  ten  thousand  guineas.'     They  led  him  off,  and  arriv- 

provisions  to  New  York,  or   otherwise   doing  service  ing  in  the  evening  at  North  Castle,  they  delivered  him 

to    the    British.     On    that    morning,    after  setting    a  with  his  papers  to  Lieutenant  Colonel  Jameson,  who 

reserve  of  four  to  keep  watch  in  the  rear,  he  and  David  commanded  the  post,  and  then  went  their  way,  not 

Williams  of  Tarrytown,  and  Isaac  Van  Wart  of  Green-  asking  a  reward  for    their  services,   nor  leaving  their 

burg,  seated  themselves  in  the  thicket  by  the  wayside,  names.' — Bancroft,  vol.  x.  pp.  387,  388. 

just  above  Tarrytown,  and  whiled  away  the  time  by  '  Washington  sought  out  the   three  young  men  who, 

playing  cards.     At  an  hour  before  noon  Andr6  was  '  leaning  only  on  their  virtue  and  honest  sense  of  their 

just  rising  the  hill  out  of  Sleepy  Hollow,  within  fifteen  duty,'  could  not  be  tempted  by  gold  ;  and  on  his  report 

miles  of  the  strong  British  post  at  King's  Bridge,  when  Congress  voted  them  annuities  in  words  of  respget  and 

Paulding  got  up,  presented  a  firelock   to  his  breast,  honor.' — Ibid.,  p.  395. 

and  asked  which  way  he  was  going.  Full  of  the  idea  Audrfs  Monument  in  Westminster  Abbey.- - 
that  he  could  meet  none  but  friends  to  the  English,  he  '  His  king  did  right  in  offering  honorable  rank  to  his 
answered  :  '  Gentlemen,  I  hope  you  belong  to  our  brother,  and  in  granting  pensions  to  his  mother  and 
party.'  '  Which  party ?' asked  Paulding.  'The  lower  sisters;  but  not  in  raising  a  memorial  to  his  name  in 
party,'  said  Andre".  Paulding  answered  that  he  did.  Westminster  Abbey.  Such  honor  belongs  to  other  en- 
Then  said  Andre\  '  1  am  a  British  officer,  out  on  par-  terprises  and  deeds.  The  tablet  has  no  fit  place  in  a 
ticular  business,  and  I  hope  you  will  not  detain  me  a  sanctuary  dear  from  its  monuments  to  every  friend  to 
minute.'  Upon  this  Paulding  ordered  him  to  dismount,  genius  and  mankind.' — Ibid.,  p.  393. 
Seeing  his  mistake,  Andre  showed  his  pass  from  Andre's  Death  on  the  Gibbet— Its  Justification.— 
Arnold,  saying  :  '  By  your  stopping  me  you  will  detain  ♦  Meantime  Andre"  entreated  with  touching  earnestness, 
the  General's  business.'  '  I  hope,'  answered  Paulding,  ^  he  j  fa  nQt  difi  0Q  ^  ^bbet ,  Washington  ai  d 
'you  will  not  be  offended ;  we  do  not  mean  to  take  .  -  _  .  .  .  r.  .  _ 
anything  from  you.  There  are  many  bad  people  go-  every  other  officer  in  the  American  army  were  moved  :o 
ing  along  the  road  ;  perhaps  you  may  be  one  of  them  ; '  the  deepest  compassion  ;  and  Hamilton,  who  has  left  his 
and  he  asked  if  he  had  any  letters  about  him.  Andre"  opinion  that  no  one  ever  suffered  death  with  more  justice, 
answered:  'No.'  They  took  him  into  the  bush  to  d  h  thfire  was  in  muh  no  of  ^^g  him> 
search  for  papers,  and  at  last  discovered  three  parcels  ....  .  ,  ,  r  ,  •  ,  ,  ,•  r  ,• 
under  each  stocking.  Among  these  were  a  plan  of  the  wished  that  m  the  mode  of  his  death  his  feelings  as  at 
fortificaiions  of  West  Point ;  a  memorial  from  the  en-  officer  and  a  man  m  ght  be  respacted.    But  the  EdjIwI 


406  ANDRk  SLEEPS  IN  WESTMINSTER  ABBEY. 

Washington  signed  the  young  hero's  death-warrant  with  tears ;  that  Andri 
died  the  death  of  a  brave  but  unfortunate  man.  And  his  tomb  is  where 
Priests,  Heroes,  Orators,  Poets,  and  Kings  sleep,  by  the  side  of  the  great  and 
gifted  of  his  country,  in  the  Pantheon  of  England, — Westminster  Abbey. 
Every  American  who  visits  it  stops  by  his  ashes  to  read  the  inscription  which 
a  grateful  king  put  over  his  grave.1 

Muti?iy  among  the  unpaid  Troops  of  Pennsylvania  and  New  Jersey. — Tvvo 
events  now  occurred  which  foreboded  the  most  serious  consequences.  The 
Pennsylvania  soldiers  of  the  line,  amounting  to  over  fifteen  hundred  men, 
were  suffering  the  extremest  destitution,  and  on  the  night  of  the  ist  of  Janu- 
ary, 1 78 1,  they  rose  in  tumult,  and  threatened  to  march  with  arms  in  their 
hands  into  the  Hall  of  Congress,  and  get  their  pay,  or  put  an  end  to  its  ses- 
sions. Lafayette  was  supposed  to  have  unbounded  influence  over  them ;  but 
when  he  attempted  to  put  it  forth,  he  had  to  quit  the  camp.  Gen.  Wayne 
entered  their  ranks,  and  with  a  levelled  pistol  threatened  to  shoot  the  first 
man  that  opened  his  mouth ;  but  in  an  instant  five  hundred  muskets  were 
pointed  at  him.  This  was  the  moment,  of  course,  for  the  British  commanders 
to  try  the  virtue  of  gold.  Sir  Henry  Clinton  sent  three  American  Tories  of 
some  pretentions,  into  the  camp  of  mutinous  patriots,  with  tempting  offers,  and 
negotiations  were  going  on  ;  but  better  counsels  prevailed.  Congress  frankly 
exposed  the  feebleness  of  its  means,  but  made  some  provision  for  the  soldiers, 
and  gave  them  pledges  which  were  nobly  redeemed.  The  men  returned  to 
their  duty,  and  delivered  up  the  Tory  emissaries  sent  by  Clinton,  and  they 
were  hanged  during  the  next  few  minutes. 

The  infection  of  this  Pennsylvania  example  spread  to  New  Jersey,  and 
the  troops  of  that  State  proclaimed  their  intentions  of  revolt  and  violence; 
but  Washington  flew  to  the  scene  by  forced  marches,  with  an  adequate  force, 
seized  the  leaders  and  condemned  them   to  merited  punishment;  and  the 


themselves  had  established  the  exclusive  usage  of  the  country,   the  second  of  October,   1780,  aged  29,  uni- 

gallows.     At  the  beginning  of  the  war  their  officers  in  versally  beloved  and  esteemed  by  the  army  in  which  h« 

»        .        .  .  ..    «T .  .  ,.  .        .  a-  j  served,  and  lamented  even  by  his  foes.     His  Gracious 

Amenca  threatened  the  highest  American  officers  and  Sovere^  King  George  n{ f  has  caused  this  monu. 

statesmen  with   the  cord.      It  was   the  only  mode  of  ment  to  be  erected.     The  remains  of  said  Major  Andre" 

execution  authorized  by  them.      Under  the  orders  of  were  deposited  on  the  28th  of  November,  1821,  in  a 

Clinton,  Lord  Cornwallis,  in  South  Carolina,  had  set  grave  near  this  monument.1 

.  „  r      .  ,  .       _,   i   j  ihe  sarcophagus  has  two  projecting  figures  :  one 

up  the  gallows    for  those  whom  he  styled  deserters,  Gf  them,  with  a  flag  of  truce,  presenting  to  Washington 

without  regard   to  rank.     Neither  the  sentence  of  the  a  letter  Andre"  had  addressed  to  His  Excellency  the 

court  nor  the  order  of  Washington  names  death  on  night  previous   to   his  execution,  and  worded   thus  : 

the  gallows;  the  execution  took  place  in  the  manner  'Sir:  Buoyed  above  the  terror  of  death  by  the  consci- 

..      °  ,  .  ,      .       .,      ,      ,, .,  ousness  of  a  life  devoted  to  noble  purposes,  and  stained 

that    was  alone    in    use    on    both   sides.  -Ibid.,    p.  with  n0  acdoil  which  can  gIve  m/remorse(  t  trust  that 

392-  the  request  which  I  make  to  your  Excellency  at  this  se- 

1  The    monument  is  of  statuary  marble,  and  the  rious  period,  and  which  is  to  soften  my  last  moments, 

figures  were  cut  by  Van  Gelder.    On  a  moulded  panel  will  not  be  rejected.     Sympathy  towards  a  soldier  will 

base  and  plinth,  stands  the  sarcophagus,  on  which  is  surely  induce  your  Excellency  at  the  military  tribunal 

inscribed  :  to  adapt  the  mode  of  my  death  to  the  feelings  of  a  man 

'Sacred  of  honor.     Let  me  hope,  sir,  that  if  aught  in  my  char- 

TO    the    memory  acter  impresses  you  with  esteem  towards  me,  if  aughl 

of  in  my  misfortunes  marks  me  as  the  victim  of  policy  am! 

MAJOR  ANDR.fi,  not  of  resentment,  I  shall  experience  the  operation  of 

these  feelings  in  your  breast  by  being  informed  that  I 

who,  raised  by  his  merit,  at  an  early  period  of  life,  to  the  am  not  to  die  on  a  gibbet. 

rank  of  Adjutant-General  of  the  British  forces  in  Am-  '  I  have  the  honor  to  be,  your  Excellency, 

erica,  and  employed  in  an  important    but  hazardous  'John  Andk&, 

enterprise,  fell  a  victim  to  his  zeal  for  his  king  and  'Adjutant-General  of  British  Forces  in  America.' 


VICTORIES  OF  COW  PENS  AND  GUILFORD.  407 

Jersey  Boys'  were  glad  to  have  a  chance  to  get  back  again  into  the  Revolu- 
rionary  army.  This  ends  the  history  of  patriotic  mutiny  during  the  War  foi 
Independence. 

Cornwallis  advances. — Flushed  with  the  success  at  Camden,  Lord  Corn 
wallis  advanced  into  North  Carolina.  He  had  sent  forward  a  detachment 
under  the  desperate  and  flagitious  Colonel  Ferguson,  who  left  a  blackened 
ruin  in  his  wake,  till  Campbell,  Shelby,  Cleaveland,  Sevier,  M' Do  well,  and 
other  gallant  Southern  leaders  fell  upon  his  camp  on  King's  Mountain, 
where  the  wretch  and  three  hundred  of  his  men  were  cut  to  pieces,  eight 
hundred  taken  prisoners  with  1,500  stand  of  arms,  and  the  rest  utterly  dis- 
persed. Our  early  historians  say  that  this  defeat  at  King's  Mountain  was  to 
Cornwallis  what  Bennington  was  to  Burgoyne.  It  had  a  like  inspiriting  effect 
upon  the  troops  in  the  South. 

Conscious  of  the  peril  of  his  position,  and  mortified  by  the  miscarriage  of 
Ferguson's  expedition,  and  knowing  that  he  was  watched  by  the  eagle  eyes 
of  Sumpter  and  Marion,  he  fell  back  on  South  Carolina,  and  sent  Tarleton 
in  pursuit  of  his  pursuers ;  and  so  the  battle  in  the  South  still  raged  ;  but 
with  no  decisive  results. 

Victory  of  the  Cowpens. — Gen.  Greene  had  put  the  Southern  army  into 
two  divisions,  committing  the  command  of  one  to  Colonel  Morgan,  against 
whom  Cornwallis  sent  Tarleton,1  not  doubting  that,  with  his  characteristic 
despatch,  vigor,  and  ferocity,  he  would  soon  meet  him,  defeat  him,  and  sweep 
his  army  from  the  field.  The  result  was  the  battle  of  Cowpens — a  brilliant 
American  victory. 

Cornwallis  now  determined  to  cut  off  the  march  of  our  victorious  soldiers, 
as  they  were  pressing  on  in  haste  to  the  Fords  of  Catawba.  When  the 
British  commander  came  up,  he  found  that  the  American  army  had  crossed 
two  hours  before  him.  During  that  night,  a  heavy  storm  swept  over,  which 
swelled  the  river  into  a  flood,  and  cut  off  the  pursuit  of  the  British.  Greene 
had  time  here  to  join  Morgan,  and  another  series  of  forced  marches  began 
from  the  Catawba,  on  to  the  Yadkin.  Once  more  the  Americans  reached  the 
opposite  bank  before  the  British  came  in  sight  on  their  rear ;  and  the  Yadkin, 
like  the  Catawba,  was  swelled  into  a  flood  by  another  storm,  and  again  the 
Southern  army  was  saved. 

The  Battle  of  Guilford  Court-House. — A  bloody  but  indecisive  battle  was 
fought  between  Gen.  Greene  and  Lord  Cornwallis,  in  which  upwards  of  ten 
thousand  men  were  hotly  engaged,  the  loss  hardly  falling  short  of  fifteen 
hundred  men  on  either  side.  This  is  known  as  the  battle  of  Guilford  Court- 
House,  March  15,  1781.     The  British  commanders  found  that  the  longer  the 

1  Contrast  between  Marion  and  Tarleton.—'  In  private  property,  he  had  the  love  and  confidence  of  a! 

the  swamps  'etween  the  Pedee  and   Santee,  Marion  people  in  that  part  of  the  country.      Tarleton' s  legion 

and  his  men   kept  watch.      Of  delicate  organization,  had  laid  it  waste  to  inspire  terror  ;  and,  m  unrestrained 

sensitive  to  truth  and  honor  and  right,  humane,  averse  freedom  of  motion,  partisans  gathered  round  Mariol 

to  bloodshed,  never  wreaking  vengeance  nor  suffering  to  redeem  their  land.' — Bancroft,  vol.  x.  p.  331. 
those  around  him  to  do  so,    scrupulously    respecting 


4o8  GREENE'S  GENERALSHIP  IN  THE  SOUTH. 

war  continued,  the  better  the  Americans  fought.  Their  courage  may  navt 
been  no  greater,  although,  as  men  grow  familiar  with  scenes  of  carnage  and 
military  struggles,  they  grow  more  hardy,  and  confident  in  the  hour  of  danger. 
Finding  that,  in  scarcely  a  single  instance,  were  they  worsted,  except  against 
heavy  odds,  they  had  occasion  to  feel  increased  confidence  in  themselves  and 
their  commanders.  Lord  Cornwallis  was  therefore  mortified  and  disap- 
pointed, as  he  drew  off  his  forces  towards  the  North,  abandoning  most  reluc- 
tantly the  hope  of  breaking  up  Gen.  Greene's  division. 

Arnold  was  now  in  Virginia,  fighting  with  his  accustomed  desperation 
against  the  Republic  he  had  betrayed ;  and  it  was  apparent  on  all  sides,  that 
the  protracted  struggle  between  the  Colonies  of  the  British  Empire  was  likely 
to  be  decided  on  the  plains  of  Virginia.  Rawdon,  with  a  large  force,  was 
hard  pressed  by  Gen.  Greene.  And  as,  within  two  months,  nearly  all  the 
forts  of  the  English  in  the  South,  had  either  been  captured  by  the  Americans, 
or  abandoned  by  the  English  *  and  as '  Marion,  Sumpter,  Lee,  and  Greene 
were  crowding  him  from  all  sides,  Rawdon  retreated  towards  Charleston. 
Soon  after  he  was  succeeded  by  Colonel  Stuart,  who  occupied  Eutaw  Springs 
— a  strong  position — and  had  a  powerful  and  completely  disciplined  and  ef- 
fective military  force.  To  all  appearances,  the  resolution  of  Gen.  Greene  to 
engage  the  British  army,  was  imprudent ;  yet  his  men  were  so  ready  for  an 
engagement — he  so  completely  understood  the  position  of  both  parties,  and 
the  immense  results  that  would  follow  even  a  partial  victory — when  the  ad- 
vantages were  on  the  British  side — he  determined  to  attack  Colonel  Stuart, 
and  bring  on  the  battle  at  once. 

Greene's  brilliant  Generalship  in  the  South. — The  battle  of  Eutaw  Springe 
took  place  on  the  8th  of  September,  1 781.  It  lasted  nearly  four  hours,  and  wai 
one  of  the  hardest  fought  fields  of  the  Revolution.  The  commanders  displayed 
the  highest  ability,  and  both  armies  seemed  to  be  conscious  that  they  were 
contending  for  the  prize  of  the  Southern  Colonies.  Almost  every  ruse  known 
to  the  art  of  war,  was  practised  by  the  British  general ;  but  in  every  one 
he  was  foiled  by  his  antagonist.  Every  evolution  of  the  enemy  met  a  corre- 
sponding movement  or  repulse  from  the  American  side  ;  and  hour  after  hour, 
the  struggle  went  on  with  a  steady  flow  of  blood,  fortune  seeming  reluctant  to 
light  on  either  banner.  At  last,  by  a  skilful  and  bold  movement  on  the  part 
of  the  American  commander,  the  British  were  thrown  into  confusion,  and 
obliged  to  abandon  the  field,  leaving  behind  them  eight  hundred  wounded 
and  dead,  and  five  hundred  prisoners.  The  British  fell  back  upon  Charleston, 
and  thus  all  Georgia  and  South  Carolina,  with  the  exception  of  their  capitals, 
once  more  fell  into  American  hands.1 

1  Major-Central  Greene. — Nathaniel  Greene  was  out  for  a  major-general  in  the   American  army.     His 

torn  in  Warwick.  Rhode    Island,  May  27th,  1742,  and  father  owned  a  forge,  and  to  this  Nathaniel  was  finally 

hence  was  a  young  man  at  the  breaking  out  of  the  Re-  promoted  from  the  farm,  and  worked  at   the  anvil  with 

volution.  His  father  was  a  Quaker  preacher  ;  and  young  the  same  vigor  he  afterwards  did  in  hammering  out  hit 

Nathaniel  was  early  instructed  in  the  principles  of  peace  own  fortune. — J.  T.   Headley's  Washington  and  his 

and  universal   brotherhood.      To  have  seen  him  about  Generals,  vol.  li.  pp.  7,  8. 

on  the  farm,  in  his  drab  suit  and   broad-brimmed  hat,  Years  before,  the  English  officer  opposed  to  him  \v 

•r  sitting  meek  and    grave  as   a  statue  in  one  of  those  Jersey  wrote,  saying,  '  Greene  is  dangerous  as  Washv 

•ilent  conventicles,  one  would  -\ever  have  picked  him  mgton — he  is  vigilant,  enterprising,  and  full  of  resom> 


THE  WAR  DRAWING  TO  A  CLOSE. 


409 


Cornwallis  posts  himself  at  Yorktown. — Finding  it  not  only  hazardous, 
but  impossible  any  longer  to  keep  the  open  field  against  the  skilful  strata- 
gems  and  bold  onsets  of  the  patriot  forces,  Cornvvallis  marched  north  into 
Virginia,  where,  being  reinforced  by  the.  divisions  under  Arnold  and  Phillips, 
the  most  wasteful  and  desolating  depredations  were  committed  through  the 
State.1  It  was  estimated  that  thirty  thousand  slaves  were  carried  frQm  Vir- 
ginia, and  property  destroyed  to  the  amount  of  fifteen  million  dollars.  At 
last,  when  he  saw  that  the  American  forces  were  pressing  upon  him  from  the 
South  to  join  Gen.  Greene,  and  down  on  him  from  the  North  under  Wash- 
ington, Cornwallis  posted  himself  at  Yorktown,  which  he  strongly  fortified ; 
and  prepared  for  a  decisive  engagement. 


SECTION  SIXTH. 

THE   WAR   FOR   INDEPENDENCE   DRAWING   TO   A   CLOSE. 

Concentration  of  the  Allied  Forces  around  Yorktown. — 'Intelligence  had 
reached  the  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  American  army  that  a  large  force, 
under  Count  de  Grasse,  was  to  arrive  in  the  Chesapeake.     Concerted  action 


ces  ;'  and  the  Chevalier  de  la  Luzerne,  Knight  of  Malta, 
in  speaking  of  his  southern  campaign,  said:  '  Other 
generals  subdue  their  enemy  by  the  means  which  their 
country  or  sovereign  furnishes  them  ;  but  Greene  ap- 
pears to  reduce  his  enemy  by  his  own  means.  He  com- 
menced his  campaign  without  either  an  army,  pro- 
visions, or  military  stores.  He  has  asked  for  nothing 
since  ;  and  yet,  scarcely  a  post  arrives  from  the  South 
that  does  not  bring  intelligence  of  some  new  advantage 
gained  over  the  foe.  He  conquers  by  magic.  History 
furnishes  no  parallel  to  this.' 

'The  resources  of  his  mind  were  inexhaustible — 
there  was  no  gulf  out  of  which  he  could  not  find  a  way 
of  escape,  and  no  plan,  if  necessary,  too  hopeless  for 
him  to  attempt.  Without  a  dollar  from  government,  and 
penniless  himself,  he  nevertheless  managed  to  keep  an 
army  in  the  field,  and  conquer  with  it.  Tine,  it  was 
half-naked  and  half-starved  ;  but  by  his  wonderful 
power  he  succeeded  in  holding  it  together.  His  sol- 
diers loved  him  with  devotion,  and  having  seen  him 
extricate  himself  so  often  from  apparently  inevitable 
ruin,  they  at  length  came  to  regard  him  as  invincible. 
Sharing  all  their  toils  and  dangers,  and  partaking  of  all 
their  sufferings,  he  so  ^rz^ud  himself  into  their  affec- 
tions that  they  wou!d  go  wherever  he  commanded. 
He  made  of  raw  tpifc'u  all  that  ever  can  be  made  of 
them,  in  the  short  time  he  had  them  under  his  control. 

'  His  patiiotLra  »:as  of  the  purest  kind,  and  Wash- 
ington spoke  from  correct  knowledge  when  he  said  : 
"  Could  he  but  promote  the  interests  of  his  country  in 
the  character  of  a  corporal,  he  would  exchange,  with- 
out a  murvmr,  his  epaulettes  for  the  knot."  His  own 
reputatioj  aiid  life  he  regarded  as  nothing  in  the  cause 
of  freedom.  Next  to  his  country,  he  loved  Washington  ; 
and  no  mean  ambition  or  envy  of  his  great  leader 
ever  sullied  his  noble  character.  That  affection  was  re- 
turned, and  the  two  heroes  moved  side  by  side,  as  tried 
friends,  through  the  revolutionary  struggle.  He  was  a 
man  whose  like  is  seldom  seen  ;  and  placed  in  any 
country,  opposed  to  any  commander,  would  have  stood 
first  in  the  rank  of  military  chie) tains.  In  the  heart  of 
Europe  with  a  veteran  army  under  his  command,  he 
v  ould  b  ive  astonished    the    world.' — Ibid.,    vol.     ii. 

PP-  76,  .7 

1  ( o  nwzllis'$  Reign  of  Terror. — In  carrying 
»i» .  )  is  f  .ar.  the  first  measure  of  Cornwallis  was  a 
ui/  - '  .  '  f-ror.  Professing  to  regard  South  Carolina 
a<   r<   t  :  d  to  the  dominion  of  George  the  Third,  he 


accepted  the  suggestions  of  Martin  and  Tarleton,  and 
the  like,  that  severity  was  the  true  mode  to  hold  the 
recovered  province.  He  therefore  addressed  the  most 
stringent  orders  to  the  commandants  at  Ninety-Six  and 
other  posts,  to  imprison  all  who  would  not  take  up 
arms  for  the  king,  and  to  -seize  or  destroy  their  whole 
property.  He  most  positively  enjoined  that  every  mil- 
ltia-man  who  had  borne  arms  with  the  British  and  had 
afterwards  joined  the  Americans  should  be  hanged  im- 
mediately. He  set  up  the  gallows  at  Camden  for  the 
indiscriminate  execution  of  those  among  his  prisoners 
who  had  formerly  given  their  parole,  even  when  it  had 
been  kept  till  it  was  cancelled  by  the  proclamation  of 
Clinton.  To  bring  these  men  to  the  gibbet  was  an  act 
of  military  murder. 

The  destruction  of  property  and  life  assumed  still 
more  hideous  forms,  when  the  peremptory  orders  and 
example  of  Cornwallis  were  followed  by  subordinates 
in  remote  districts,  away  from  supervision.  Cruel 
measures  seek  and  are  sure  to  find  cruel  executive 
agents  ;  officers  whose  delight  was  in  blood  patrolled 
the  country,  burned  houses,  ravaged  estates,  and  put 
to  death  whom  they  would.  The  wives  and  daughters 
of  the  opulent  were  left  with  no  fit  clothing,  no  shelter 
but  a  hovel  too  mean  to  attract  the  destroyer.  Of  a 
sudden,  the  woodman  in  his  cabin  would  find  his  house 
surrounded,  and  he  himself,  or  his  guest,  might  be 
shot,  because  he  was  not  in  arms  for  the  king.  There 
was  no  question  of  proofs,  and  no  trial.  For  two  years 
cold-blooded  assassinations,  often  in  the  house  of  the 
victim,  and  in  the  presence  of  his  wife  and  little  chil- 
dren, were  perpetrated  by  men  holding  the  king's 
commission,  and  they  obtained  not  indemnity  merely, 
but  rewards  for  their  zeal.  The  enemy  were  deter, 
mined  to  break  every  man's  spirit,  or  to  ruin  him.  No 
engagement  by  proclamation  or  by  capitulation  was 
respected. 

The  ruthless  administration  of  Cornwallis  met  the 
hearty  and  repeated  applause  of  I  ord  George  Germain, 
who  declared  himself  convinced  that '  to  punish  rebellion 
would  have  the  best  consequences.'  As  to  the  rebels,  his 
orders  to  Clinton  and  Cornwallis  were  :  '  No  good 
faith  or  justice  is  to  be  expected  frum  them,  and  w« 
ought,  in  all  our  transactions  with  them,  to  act  upon 
that  supposition.'  In  this  manner  the  minister  released 
his  generals  from  their  pledges  to  those  on  whom  thej 
made  war. — Bancroft,  vol.  x.  pp.  327-S-9. 


4io  HISTORICAL  TRIBUTES  TO  CONNECTICUT. 

immediately  took  place  between  Washington,  Count  Rochambeau,  the  French 
Commander-in-Chief,  and  Admiral  de  Grasse,  by  which  the  French  and  Amer- 
ican forces  by  land  and  sea,  were  to  fall  upon  Cornwallis  at  Yorktown,  and 
thus  strike  a  decisive  blow.  Sir  Henry  Clinton  still  occupied  New  York  with 
a  large  force  ;  and  as  the  allied  armies  appeared  to  be  centring  for  a  de- 
cisive blow,  he  did  not  doubt  that  they  intended  to  attack  him  in  that 
city.  He  was  the  more  convinced  of  it  since  Washington  began  to  move 
south  through  New  Jersey ;  for  he  only  regarded  this  as  a  feint  intended  to 
draw  the  British  army  away  from  its  defences.  But  Washington's  eye  was 
fixed  upon  Cornwallis,  at  Yorktown ;  and  he  had  already  got  so  far,  it  was 
no  longer  in  the  power  of  Clinton  to  stop  him.  This  masterly  movement, 
which  equalled  in  celerity,  confidence,  and  skill,  some  of  the  rapid  and  bold 
movements  of  Napoleon,  fixed  the  stamp  of  the  highest  generalship  upon 
Washington.  So  well  had  the  movements  of  the  army  and  the  fleet  been 
concerted,  that  de  Grasse  entered  the  mouth  of  the  Chesapeake  with  twenty- 
five  sail  of  the  line,  only  one  hour  before  Washington  arrived  at  the  head  of  the 
Elk.  The  mouths  of  the  York  and  James  rivers  were  immediately  blockaded, 
and  all  communication  between  the  British  army  at  New  York  and  their 
forces  at  Yorktown  was  hopelessly  cut  off.  In  the  meantime  a  French  squad- 
ron from  Rhode  Island,  safely  shot  by  the  British  fleet  on  the  coast,  carrying 
the  artillery  required  for  the  siege. 

The  crowning  Infamy  of  Benedict  Arnold' s  Life. — Before  we  come  to  the 
final  battle  of  the  War  for  Independence,  it  will  be  in  the  order  of  events  to 
take  some  notice  of  the  last  act  of  infamy  in  the  history  of  the  arch-traitor  of 
America.     It  was  perpetrated  on  the  spot  which  had  given  him  birth. 

The  heroic  part  which  Connecticut  took  in  the  Revolution;  her  contribu- 
tions in  men,  money,  and  munitions  of  war ;  the  achievements  of  her  seamen 
on  the  ocean,  and  the  sacrifices  she  made  in  the  cause  of  liberty,  I  have 
had  no  space  to  rehearse  ;  '  the  world  knows  them  by  heart.'  In  receiving 
from  American  historians,1  as  she  has,  a  just  recognition  of  her  prominent  par- 

1  From  the  establishment  of  the  Colony  of  Connec-  great  distance.     Next  to  Franklin's  journal  in  Philadel- 

ticut,  the  most  advanced  ideas  of  civil  liberty  pervaded  phia,  the  '  Connecticut  Gazette''  in  New  London,  was 

her  people  ;  and  the  part  she  acted  in  colonial  history  is  the  most  influential  newspaper  on  the  continent.      It 

a  bright  record  of  honor  and  heroism.     She  was  one  of  contained  the  ablest  essays  on  the  political  condition 

the  earliest  of  the  colonies  in  undertaking  the  great  work  and  rights  of  the  colonies  ever  published.     Her  Assem- 

of  independence,  and,  although  her  territory  was  com-  bly  had,  before  the  meeting  of  the  Stamp  Act  Congress, 

paratively  small,  yet  the  compactness  of  her  population,  voted  American  taxation  by  a  British  Parliament  to  be 

and  the  amount  of  her  wealth  made  her  military  re-  '  unprecedented   and    unconstitutional.'      Had    there 

sources  second  only  to  those  of  Massachusetts.     In  the  been    no    other    men  than    Pitkin,   Trumbull,    Dyer, 

protection  of  her  charter— see  history  of  charter  oak— she  Styles,  and  the  incomparable  Stephen  Johnson  to  press 

had  displayed  a  jealous  vigilance  in  the  protection  of  the  rights  of  the  colonies,  there  was  one  man  who  would 

her  liberty,  of  which  we  read  now  with  a  lively  thrill.  have  left  an  immortal  record,  and  who  in  himself  was 

In  the  intelligence  of  her  people  she  was  unsurpassed  enough  to  represent  a  great  and  illuminated  common- 

by  any  community  on  the  globe.     She  commanded  an  wealth.     Timothy   Green,  the  publisher  of  the  Nei» 

influence  and  power  over  the  destinies  of  the  country,  London  Gazette,  was  as  unbending  as  oak.    On  Friday 

and  assumed  the  direction    of  public  opinion,  which,  the  first  day  of  November,  when  the  Stamp  Act  was  to 

although  it  partook  sometimes  of  the  spirit  of  dictation,  go  into  effect,  he  had   boldly  committed  treason  by 

yet  which  was  cheerfully  acceded  to  by  her  sistei  col-  bringing  out  the  regular  issue  of  his  paper  widiout  a 

onies.     In  journalism    she   stood    not   a  whit  behind  stamp. — Bancroft,  vol.  v.  p.  353,  354. 
Boston  or  Philadelphia,  while  she  led  New  York  by  a  The  royalists  of  the  country  railed  at  Connecticut  al 


CONNECTICUTS  PLACE  IN  THE  REPUBLIC.  41 1 

ticipation  in  the  nation's  struggles  and  progress,  she  can  have  no  cause  to 
complain  ;  nor  does  she  need  any  other  eulogium  than  the  deeds  of  her  chil 
dren.  It  detracts  nothing  from  the  honor  of  the  other  twelve  Colonies  to  say 
that  Connecticut  has  been  the  eagle's  nest  of  the  Republic.  In  the  superior 
character  of  her  original  settlers ;  in  the  establishment  of  a  system  of  educa- 
tion for  all  her  population ;  in  the  emigration  of  her  people  to  Vermont,  and 
afterwards  to  Central  New  York;  in  the  establishment  of  another  Connecti- 
cut in  Ohio,  and  in  leading  the  way  to  the  shores  of  the  Pacific ;  in  the  num. 
ber  of  educated  men  whom  she  has  sent  out  to  found  institutions  of  learning; 
in  the  legislation  of  Congress  and  the  separate  States  ;  in  shaping  the  Judiciary 
of  the  United  States  ;  in  promoting  domestic  and  foreign  commerce ;  in  her 
vast  contributions  of  inventions  for  saving  labor  and  the  promotion  of  the 
mechanical  arts ;  and  in  every  department  of  human  effort  for  the  advance- 
ment of  civilization,  she  has  laid  a  fair  claim  to  the  gratitude  and  admiration 
of  mankind,  and  this  claim  has  always  been  cheerfully  allowed.  Her  south- 
ern border  washed  by  the  waters  of  the  Atlantic,  and  all  her  rivers  swelled 
by  its  tides— like  those  of  Massachusetts  and  Rhode  Island— no  barrier  lay 
between  her  and  our  foes,  except  the  ocean,  which  offered  another  home  for 
her  mariners,  and  allured  them  to  the  most  distant  seas.  To  have  protected 
her  coasts  against  the  invasions  of  the  British  navy,  and  the  landing  of  hostile 
expeditions  could  not  have  been  effected  by  a  Chinese  wall,  or  a  score  of 
Gibraltars.  She  was  safe  only  behind  her  ramparts  of  men,  and  the  strongest 
and  best  of  them  were  now  conquering,  or  falling  in  other  fields. 

Sir  Henry  Clinton  had  allowed  the  French  squandron  from  Rhode  Island 
to  escape  the  British  fleet  and  reach  the  southern  coast,  while  Washington's 

4 a  land  of  republicans,'  and  maligned  Yale  College  is  embarked  with  yours,  and  am  deeply  touched  at 

as  a    seminary  of  Democracy,  the  prolific  mother  of  heart  for  your  distress.     O  my  country  !  my  dear,  dis- 

patriots  ;  for  in  a  letter  written  by  Gage  to  Sir  William  tressed  country  !     For  you   I  have  wrote  ;  for  you  I 

Johnson,  September  20th,  1765,  he  uses  the  words  '  the  daily  pray  and  mourn  ;  and  to  save  your  invaluable 

pretended  patriots  educated  in  a  seminary  of  Demo-  rights  and  freedom,  I  would  willingly  die. 
cracy.'  'Forgive  my  lamenting  tears.     The  dear  Saviour 

'The  liberty  of  free  inquiry,'  said  Stephen  John-  himself  wept  over  his  native  country,  doomed  to  destruc- 

sonofLyme,   '  is  one  of  the  first  and  most  fundamental  tion.     We  appeal  to  our  Supreme  Judge  against  the 

of  a  free  people.    They  have  an  undoubted  right  to  be  hand  whence  these  evils  are  coming.     If  we  perish,  we 

heard  and  relieved.     They  may  publish  their  griev-  perish,  being  innocent,  and  our  blood  will  be  required  at 

ances  ;  the  press  is  open  and  free.  their  hands.     Shut  not  your  eyes  to  your  danger,  O  ! 

'  We  may  go  on  to  enjoy  our  rights  and  liberties  as  my  countrymen.  Do  nothing  »o  destroy  or  betray  the 
usual.  The  American  governments  or  inhabitants  may  rights  of  your  posterity  ;  do  nothing  to  sully  or  shade 
associate  for  the  mutual  defence  of  their  birthright  lib-  the  memory  of  your  noble  ancestors.  Let  all  the  gov- 
erties.  A  person  or  people  collectively  may  enjoy  and  ernments  and  all  the  inhabitants  in  them  unitedly  re- 
defend  their  own.  The  hearts  of  the  Americans  are  solve  to  a  man,  with  an  immovable  stability,  to  sacrifice 
cut  to  the  quick  by  the  Act;  we  have  reason  to  fear  their  lives  and  fortunes  before  they  will  part  with  their 
very  interesting  and  terrible  consequences,  though  by  invaluable  freedom.  It  will  give  you  a  happy  peace  in 
no  means  equal  to  tyranny  or  slavery.  But  what  an  your  own  breasts,  and  secure  you  the  most  endeared 
enraged,  despairing  people  will  do,  when  they  come  to  affection,  thanks,  and  blessing  of  your  posterity  ;  it  will 
see  and  feel  their  ruin,  time  only  can  reveal.  gain  you  the  esteem  of  all  true  patriots  and  friends  of 

"  It  is  the  joy  of  thousands,  that  there  is  union  and  liberty  through  the  whole  realm  ;  yea,  and  as  far  as 

concurrence  in  a  general  Congress.    We  trust  they  will  your  case  is  known,  it  will  gain  you  the  esteem  of  all 

also  lay  a  foundation  for  another  Congress.   The  Amer-  true  patriots  and  friends  of  liberty  through  the  whol« 

tcan  colonies  cannot  be  enslaved  but  by  their  own  folly,  lealm,  yea,  and  as  far  as  your  case  is  known  it  will  gain 

consent,  or  inactivity.     Truly  Britons  have  nothing  at  you  the  esteem  and  the  admiration  of  the  whole  world.' 

all  to  hope  for  from  this  most    unnatural  war.      My  — New  London   Gazette,    103,  Friday,  1   November, 

cc  jntrymen,  your  concern  is  great,  universal,  and  most  1765. 
Vit     I  am  an  American  born,  and  my  all  in  this  world 


412  ARNOLD'S  MARA UD  ON  NEW  LONDON. 

army  in  the  march  southward,  was  already  beyond  his  reach.  He  must  now 
atone  for  this  twofold  blunder  and  disaster  as  best  he  could.  He  conceived 
an  expedition,  which  he  intended  should  be  formidable  and  destructive  enough 
to  create  a  profound  sensation,  and  divert,  at  least,  some  of  the  force  that  Wash- 
ington was  concentrating  at  Yorktown.  New  London  being  one  of  the  best 
harbors  on  the  coast,  and  having  a  large  quantity  of  shipping  then  in  port, 
had  also  on  store  large  amounts  of  West  India  goods  and  European  merchan- 
dise, captured  by  successful  privateers.  The  Hannah,  the  richest  merchant 
ship  brought  into  America  during  the  war,  had  just  been  taken  into  New 
London  by  the  privateer  Minerva.  This  port  thus  offered  too  fair  an  induce- 
ment for  one  of  those  marauding  and  murderous  expeditions,  which  had  a 
greater  charm  for  our  enemies  than  regular  warfare.  Of  course  there  was 
only  one  man  in  the  world  Clinton  thought  of  to  conduct  such  an  expedition. 
Arnold  had  just  returned  from  his  Virginia  raid,  and  was  flattered  at  the  invi- 
tation to  make  a  similar  maraud  on  his  birth-place.  The  expedition  was 
planned  at  the  British  headquarters  in  New  York.  It  was  Arnold's  intention 
with  his  fleet — consisting  of  thirty-two  sail  of  all  classes  of  vessels,  and  carry- 
ing not  less  than  eighteen  hundred  men — to  steal  into  the  harbor  at  dead  of 
night,  and,  taking  possession  of  the  fortifications  on  both  sides  of  the  river,  to 
seize  or  destroy  the  shipping,  public  offices,  stores,  and  merchandise,  before  a 
sufficient  force  could  be  gathered  to  oppose  him.  Attempts  have  been  made 
to  shield  him  from  more  barbarous  intentions  ;  but  events  proved  that  nothing 
would  satisfy  his  vengeance  but  to  lay  his  birth-place  in  ashes,  and  sodden  it 
with  the  blood  of  his  former  friends  and  neighbors.'  But  a  change  in  the 
wind  prevented  his  landing,  and  at  early  daybreak,  the  fleet  being  discovered 
off  the  harbor,  the  signal  agreed  upon  and  understood  as  far  as  heavy  cannon 
could  be  heard,  was  the  firing  of  two  alarm  guns  at  regular  intervals,  which 
would  bring  help.  But  some  spy  had  revealed  this  concerted  signal,  for  the 
two  guns  had  no  sooner  been  heard,  than  a  third  was  fired  from  the  fleet, 
thus  converting  the  signal  of  alarm  into  one  of  rejoicing.  '  This  stratagem  had 
some  influence  in  retarding  the  arrival  of  the  militia.  In  the  town,  conster- 
nation and  fright  were  suddenly  let  loose.  No  sooner  were  the  terrible  alarm- 
guns  heard,  than  the  startled  citizens,  leaping  from  their  beds,  made  haste  to 
send  away  their  families,  and  their  portable  and  most  valuable  goods.  Throngs 
of  women  and  children  were  dismissed  into  the  fields  and  woods,  some  without 
food,  and  others  with  a  piece  of  bread  or  a  biscuit  in  their  hands.  Women 
laden  with  bags  and  pillow-cases,  or  driving  a  cow  before  them,  with  an  infant 
in  their  arms,  or  perhaps  on  horseback  with  a  bed  under  them,  and  various 
utensils  dangling  at  the  side  ;  boys  with  stockings  slung  like  wallets  over  their 
shoulders,  containing  the  money,  the  papers,  and  other  small  valuables  of  the 

1  In  Arnold's  official  report  he  says  :  '  At  ten  o'clock  mand  of  Lieutenant  Col.  Eyre.     The  division   on  the 

the  troops,  in  two  divisions  and  in  four  debarkations,  New  London  side  consisted  of  the  38th  regiment,  the 

were  landed,  one  on  each  side  of  the  harbor,  about  Loyal  Americans,  the  American  Legion,  refugees,  and 

three  miles  from  New  London  ;  that  on  the  Groton  a  detachment  of  sixty  yagers,   who  were  immediately 

side  consisting  of  the  40th  and  54th  regiments,  and  the  on  their  landing  put  in  motion.' — Hist,  of  New  Lon- 

third  battalion  of  New  Jersey  Volunteers,  with  a  de-  don,  by  F.  M.  Caulkins,  p.  546. 
tachment  of  yagers  and  artillerj    were  under  the  con: 


EVACUATION  OF  NEW  LONDON.  4T3 

family  ;  carts  laden  with  furniture  «  dogs  and  other  household  animals  looking 
strange  and  panic-struck ;  pallid  faces  and  trembling  limbs— such  were  the 
scenes  presented  on  all  the  roads  leading  into  the  country.  Many  of  these 
groups  wandered  all  day  in  the  woods,  and  at  night  found  shelter  in  the  scat- 
tered farm-houses  and  barns. 

■  Amid  the  bustle  of  these  scenes,  when  each  one  was  laden  with  what  was 
nearest  at  hand,  or  dearest  to  his  heart,  one  man  was  seen  hastening  along  to 
the  burial-ground,  with  a  small  coffin  under  his  arm.  His  child  had  died  the 
day  before,  and  he  could  not  leave  it  unburied.  In  haste  and  trepidation,  he 
threw  up  the  mold,  and  deposited  his  precious  burden  ;  then  covering  it 
quickly,  and  setting  up  a  stone  to  mark  the  place,  he  hurried  away  to  secure 
other  beloved  ones  from  a  more  cruel  spoiler. 

*  Such  was  the  confusion  of  the  scene,  that  families,  in  many  cases,  were 
scattered  upon  different  roads ;  and  children,  eight  or  ten  years  of  age,  were 
sent  off  alone  into  the  country,  their  parents  lingering  perhaps  to  bury  or  con- 
ceal some  of  their  effects,  yet  no  one  was  lost,  no  one  was  hurt.  The  farm- 
houses were  full,  and  unbounded  hospitality  was  shown  by  their  occupants. 
At  Gen.  Miller's,  a  little  off  from  the  Norwich  road,  orders  were  given  to 
open  the  dairy  and  the  larder,  to  prepare  food  constantly,  and  to  feed  eveiy- 
body  that  came.  When  the  house  was  overflowing,  the  servants  carried  out 
milk,  cheese  and  bread,  or  porringers  of  corn-beans  to  the  children,  who  sat 
under  the  trees  and  ate.  This  will  serve  as  an  example  of  the  general  hospi- 
tality. A  number  of  families  found  shelter  among  friends  and  relatives  in 
the  North  Parish.  Groups  of  fugitives  gathered  on  the  high  hills  afar  off, 
watching  with  intense  interest  the  movements  of  the  enemy,  whose  course 
might  be  traced  by  their  gleaming  arms  and  scarlet  coats,  until  clouds  of 
smoke  hid  them  from  view.  Some  sick  persons  were  removed  from  town  with 
great  difficulty,  and  at  the  hazard  of  their  lives ;  others,  who  could  not  be  re- 
moved, were  guarded  with  solicitous  care  by  wife,  daughter,  or  mother,  who 
resolved  to  remain  with  them,  and  depend  on  Providence  to  soften  the  heart 
of  the  foe,  and  protect  them  from  danger. 

'Col.  Ledyard,  having  visited  the  town  and  Fort  Trumbull,  and  made  the 
best  disposition  of  what  force  he  could  find,  and  having  dispatched  expresses 
to  Governor  Trumbull  at  Lebanon,  and  to  commanders  of  militia  in  the 
neighborhood,  returned  to  Fort  Griswold. 

1  As  he  stepped  into  the  boat  to  cross  the  ferry,  he  said  to  some  friends, 
whose  hands  he  pressed  at  parting,  in  a  f:rm  tone  :  "  If  I  must  lose  to-day 
honor  or  life,  you  who  know  me  can  tell  which  it  will  be.' "  ' 

1  Miss  Caulkins,  from  whose  admirable  History  of  ful  he.<ps  of  dead  had  been  removed.     Gen.  Arnold's 

New  London  the  above  passages  have  been  cited, —  report  NBMl  : 

P«  565*  says  :  '  About  sunset  they  began  to  embark  on  "A  s'ery  considerable  magazine  of  powder,  and  bar- 
both  sides  of  the  river  ;  a  delay  of  two  hours  would  racks  to  contain  300  men.  were  found  in  Fort  Griswold, 
probably  have  changed  the  evacuation  into  a  flight,  for  which  C*pt.  Demoine,  of  the  Royal  Artillery,  had  my 
the  militia  were  gathering  under  their  officers,  and  all  positive  directions  to  destroy ;  an  attempt  was  made 
the  roads  to  the  town  were  full  of  men  and  boys,  with  by  him,  but  unfortunately  failed.  He  had  my  orders 
every  kind  of  armor,  from  club  and  pitchfork  to  musket  to  make  the  second  attempt ;  the  reasons  why  it  was 
and  spontoon,  hurrying  to  the  onset.'  not  done  Capt.  Demoine  will   have  the   honor  to  ex- 

A  rear-guard  was  left  at  Groton  fort,  with  orders,  plain  to  your  Excellency.' 
after  all  had  decamped,  to  take  the  necessary  measures  '  It  is  supposed  to  have  been  late  in  the  evening  when 

to  blow  uf  the  magazine,  burn   the  barracks,  and  en-  Capt.  Demoine  and  his  men,    having  laid  a  train  of 

tirely  dest  >y  the  wo-ks,  from  which  all  but  the  mourn  powder  from  the  barracks  to  the  magazine,  kindled  a 


*H 


THE  DOOM  OF  THE  TRAITOR  ARNOLD. 


We  need  not  dwell  upon  the  crowning  infamy  of  massacre  after  the  sur* 
render. 

On  this  spot,  now  consecrated  by  so  much  patriotic  blood,  the  people  of 
New  London  County  have  ever  since  assembled  to  pay  their  tribute  to  th(s 
departed.  On  the  6th  of  September,  1826,  the  corner-stone  of  a  monument 
was  laid.  It  was  completed  in  1830.  *  It  is  built  of  native  rock,  quarried  not 
far  from  the  place  where  it  stands ;  is  twenty-six  feet  square  at  the  base, 
twelve  at  the  top,  and  127  in  height.  In  the  interior  a  circular  flight  of  168 
steps  leads  to  the  platform,  from  whence  a  fine  view  is  obtained,  particularly 
toward  the  west  and  south,  where  lie  New  London  and  the  river  Thames,  the 
Sound  and  its  islands.' a 


The  Doo?n  of  the  Traitor. — We  will  cast  a  single  glance  on  the  dark  path 
of  Arnold,  after  this  dastard  act.  While  the  town  where  he  used  to  play  in 
his  boyhood  was  burning,  he  stood  in  the  belfry  of  a  church  of  God  and 
looked  exultingly  on  the  conflagration.  This  was  the  last  exploit  of  this  bad 
man  in  his  native  land.  He  could  henceforth  live  only  in  the  nation  whose 
gold  had  paid  him  for  his  treason.  He  sailed  for  England.  He  entered 
.London  with  a  letter  of  introduction  from  Sir  Henry  Clinton  to  Lord 
Germain. 

When  the  petition  for  a  bill  authorizing  peace  with  America,  was  presented 
to  the  King  by  Parliament,  the  traitor  was  standing  near  the  throne,  '  appa- 
rently in  high  favor  with  his  majesty.'     Lord  Lauderdale,  on  returning  to  the 


fire  in  the  barracks,  and  retreated  to  the  ships.  With- 
out doubt,  Arnold  and  his  officers  gazed  intently  on  the 
fort,  as  they  slowly  sailed  down  the  river,  expecting 
every  moment  the  fatal  explosion,  and  were  keenly  dis- 
appointed at  the  result.  No  explosion  followed,  but 
the  failure  was  not  owing  to  remissness  or  want  of  skill 
in  the  royal  artillerist. 

'  Under  cover  of  the  night  a  number  of  Americans 
had  cautiously  approached  the  fort,  even  before  it  was 
evacuated  by  the  conquerors,  and  as  soon  as  the  rear- 
guard of  the  enemy  had  retreated  down  the  hill,  and 
the  dip  of  their  oars  was  heard  in  the  water,  they  has- 
tened to  the  gate  of  the  fort.  Major  Peters,  of  Nor- 
wich, is  understood  to  have  first  reached  the  spot. 
Perceiving  the  barracks  on  fire,  and  the  train  laid, 
without  a  moment's  hesitation,  he  perilled  life  by  enter- 
ing the  gate,  and  being  well  acquainted  with  the  inte- 
rior arrangements,  rushed  to  the  pump  for  water  to  ex- 
tinguish the  fire.  Here  he  found  nothing  that  would 
hold  water  but  an  old  cartridge-box  ;  the  spout  of  the 
pump  likewise  had  been  removed  ;  but  notwithstand- 
ing these  disadvantages,  he  succeeded  in  interrupting 
the  communication  between  the  burning  barracks  and 
the  powder.  The  heroism  of  this  act  cannot  be  too 
highly  applauded.  Others  were  soon  on  the  spot,  and 
the  fire  was  entirely  subdued.  These  adventurous 
men  supposed  that  the  wounded  as  well  as  the  dead 
had  been  left  by  the  enemy  to  be  blown  into  the  air, 
and  it  was  to  preserve  them  from  this  awful  fate  that 
they  had  hazarded  their  lives  by  entering  the  fort.  The 
fire  being  quenched,  they  hastened  to  examine  the 
heaps  of  human  forms  that  lay  around,  but  found  no 
lingering  warmth,  no  sign  to  indicate  that  life  yet  hov- 
ered in  the  frame,  and  might  be  recalled  to  conscious- 
ness. Major  Peters  easily  selected  the  lifeless  remains 
of  his  friend  Col.  Ledyard.  His  strongly  marked  fea- 
tures, calm  and  serene  in  death,  could  not  be  mista- 
ken. 

'  As  soon  as  it  was  known  that  the  British  had  re-em- 
barked, all  Groton  was  moved,  inquiring  for  her  sons. 
Women  and  children  assembled  before  the  morning 
dawn,  with  torches  in  their  hands,  examining  the  dead 


and  wounded,  in  search  of  their  friends.  They  passed 
the  light  from  face  to  face,  but  so  bloody  and  mangled 
were  they,  their  features  so  distorted  with  the  energy 
of  resistance  or  the  convulsion  of  pain,  that  in  many 
cases  the  wife  could  not  identify  her  husband,  or  the 
mother  her  son.  When  a  mournful  recognition  did 
take  place,  piteous  were  the  groans  and  lamentations 
that  succeeded.  Forty  widows  had  been  made  that 
day,  all  residing  near  the  scene  of  action.  A  woman, 
searching  for  her  husband  among  the  slain,  cleansed 
the  gore  from  more  than  thirty  faces  before  she  found 
the  remains  she  sought.' — Ibid.,  p.  566. 

1  '  On  the  west  side  of  the  monument  is  engraved 
a  list  of  the  names  of  the  victims,  eighty-three  in  num- 
ber, and  on  the  south  side  is  the  following  inscription  : 

4  "This  monument  was  erected  under  the  patronage 
of  the  State  of  Connecticut,  a.d.  1830,  and  in  the 
55th  year  of  the  Independence  of  the  U.  S.  A.,  in 
memory  of  the  patriots  who  fell  in  massacre  at  Fort 
Griswold,  near  this  spot,  on  the  6th  of  September, 
a.d.  1781,  when  the  British,  under  the  command  of 
the  traitor,  Benedict  Arnold,  burnt  the  towns  of  New 
London  and  Groton.  and  spread  desolation  and  woe 
throughout  this  region. " 

'"Zebulun  and  Naph tali  were  a  people  that  jeo- 
parded their  lives  \nto  death  in  the  high  places  of  the 
field."— Judges  v.    8. 

'  Since  the  erection  of  the  monument,  the  anniversary 
day  has  been  usually  noticed  by  gatherings  on  the 
spot  of  individuals,  and  sometimes  by  prayers  and  ad- 
dresses, but  not  often  by  a  public  celebration.  Mr. 
Jonathan  Brooks,  of  New  London,  who  died  in  1848, 
took  a  special  interest  in  this  anniversary.  For  many 
years  before  his  death,  he  resorted  annually  on  this 
day  to  Groton  Height,  and  whether  his  auditors  were 
few  or  many,  delivered  an  address,  which  was  always 
rendered  interesting  by  graphic  pictures  and  reminis« 
cences  connected  with  the  Revolution.  On  one  oc- 
casion, when  he  found  himself  almost  without  an  audi- 
ence, he  exclaimed  with  sudden  fervor,  '  Attention  / 
universe  / ' — Caulkins'  History  of  New  London,  p. 
572. 


SURRENDER  OF  CORNWALLIS. 


415 


House,  is  reported  to  have  declared  'that  however  gracious  might  be  the 
language  he  had  heard  from  the  throne,  his  indignation  could  not  but  be 
highly  excited  at  beholding  His  Majesty  supported  by  a  traitor.'  But  his 
lordship  should  have  found  no  fault  with  this.  It  was  a  tableau  befitting  the 
occasion.  Where  else  should  a  man  who  had  betrayed  the  young  Republic 
find  shelter,  if  not  under  the  sceptre  of  a  king  whose  gold  had  paid  him  for 
his  villain  work  ?  It  was,  in  fact,  the  only  spot  on  the  earth  where  the  wretch 
could  find  security,  for  everywhere  the  knowledge  of  his  treason  had  gone 
round  the  world,  and  the  human  race  elsewhere  were  not  bad  enough  to  give 
him  a  home. 

On  another  occasion,  when  Lord  Surrey  rose  to  speak  in  Parliament,  as 
his  eye  glanced  round  the  gallery  he  saw  Arnold.  Pointing  towards  him  the 
finger  of  scorn,  he  exclaimed  :  '  I  will  not  speak  while  that  man  is  in  the 
house.' 

The  black  mark  was  on  the  brow  of  the  traitor,  and  he  carried  it  to  the 
grave.  Wherever  he  went,  men  read  it.  In  England,  in  St.  Johns,  in  Guada- 
loupe— wherever  he  went,  through  his  restless  wanderings  it  followed  him  still. 
He  saw  the  infant  Republic  he  had  betrayed,  emerge  from  the  gloom  of  her 
long  struggle  into  wealth,  power,  and  splendor :  and  left  it  advancing  on  to 
empire  as  he  went  darkling  down  to  a  traitor's  grave.  He  died  in  1801, 
somewhere  in  the  wilderness  of  London.  Where  he  was  buried,  nobody  has 
told.  He  died  full  of  crime,  and  his  name  is  covered  with  infamy  by  the  ex- 
ecrations of  the  nation  he  betrayed,  and  the  nation  which  paid  him  for  his 
villain  work. 

The  Siege  of  Yorktown  and  Surrender  of  Cornwallis. — Washington  was 
vigorously  executing  his  plan  against  Cornwallis,  and  he  had  posted  himself 
before  Yorktown,  having  for  the  first  time  in  the  Revolution  so  large  an 
effective  force  under  his  command.  They  amounted  to  sixteen  thousand, 
seven  thousand  of  whom  were  French.  With  wise  precaution  to  prevent  any 
question  of  military  precedence  from  arising,  the  King  had  commissioned 
Washington  as  a  Lieutenant-General  of  France,  which  made  him  commander- 
in-chief  of  the  allied  forces.1  On  the  night  of  the  6th  of  October  they  began 
the  construction  of  their  works,  and  during  the  next  seventeen  days,  the  siege 
was  vigorously  pressed,  while  two  redoubts  had  been  simultaneously  stormed 
by  two  detachments,  one  headed  by  Lafayette  and  Colonel  Hamilton,  and 
the  other  by  De  Voimesnil,  with  his  PVench  Grenadiers. 

1  Enthusiasm  in  the  French  Army  after  their  annoyed  by  Cornwallis,  had  disembarked  at  James 
Union  with  the  Americans. — '  In  the  allied  camp  all  Island  three  thousand  men  under  the  command  of  the 
was  joy.  The  love  of  freedom  penetrated  not  the  Marquis  de  St.  Simon.  Here  too  prevailed  unanimity. 
French  officers  only,  but  inflamed  the  soldiers.  Every  St.  Simon,  though  older  in  military  service,  as  well 
one  of  them  was  proud  of  being:  a  defender  of  the  as  in  y»ars,  placed  himself  and  his  troops  as  auxiliaries 
young  republic.  The  new  principles  entered  into  their  under  the  orders  of  Lafayette,  because  he  was  a  major- 
souls,  and  became  a  part  of  their  nature.  On  the  fifth  general  in  the  service  of  the  United  States.  The  com- 
of  September  they  encamped  at  Chester.  Never  had  bhied  army  in  their  encampment  could  be  approached 
the  French  seen  a  man  penetrated  with  a  livelier  or  only  by  two  passages,  which  were  in  themselves  diffi- 
more  manifest  joy  than  Washington,  when  he  there  cult,  and  were  caretully  guarded,  so  that  Cornwallis 
learned  that  on  the  last  day  but  one  in  August,  the  could  not  act  on  the  offensive,  and  found  himself  etTec 
Count  de  Grasse,  with  twenty-eight  ships  of  the  tually  blockaded  by  land  and  by  sea.' — Uancroft,  v  ^L 
line,  and   nearly  four  thousand   land    troops,    had  en-  x.  pp.  513,  514. 

tered  the    Chesapeake,  where,  without    loss  of   time,  '  On  that  night,  says  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,  '  V  *> 

he  had  moored  most  of  the  fleet  in  Lynnhaven   Kay,  tory  twined  double  garlands  around  the  barmen    M 

block<  i  up  York  river,  and,  without  being  in  the  least  France  and  America.' 


4T6  END  OF  THE  SEVEN  YEARS'   TRAGEDY, 

1  Seeing  that  his  position  was  becoming  desperate,  Cornwallis  attempted  to 
escape  in  the  night.  He  had  embarked  his  army  in  three  divisions,  one  of 
which  had  crossed  the  river,  and  landed  at  Gloucester  Point ;  one  of  which 
was  on  the  river,  while  the  third  was  just  preparing  to  leave  the  shore.  The 
air  and  the  water  were  calm,  and  his  hopes  of  escape  were  high.  In  a  moment 
the  sky  was  overcast,  and  a  tempest  arose.  The  very  elements  seemed  armed 
against  him,  as  if  he  was  checked  by  an  invisible  power  which  watched  over 
the  American  people.  At  dawn  the  besiegers  opened  a  destructive  fire  upon 
him,  and  he  was  glad  when  the  abating  tempest  allowed  him  to  return  to  his 
almost  dismantled  fortifications.  All  hope  was  now  cut  off;  and  finding 
himself  entirely  at  the  mercy  of  the  men  he  had  scorned  and  defied  as  rebels, 
on  the  1 7th  he  sent  a  flag  of  truce  to  Washington  with  the  surrender  of  himself 
and  all  his  army.  The  conditions  of  the  surrender  were  exceedingly  honor- 
able to  Washington.'  He  showed  no  disposition  on  this  occasion,  nor  did  he 
on  any  other,  to  trample  upon  the  fallen  foe,  or  press  his  advantages  any 
further  than  the  interests  of  independence  absolutely  required.  Such  persons 
as  Cornwallis  chose  to  select,  he  was  allowed  to  put  on  board  a  sloop,  and 
they  were  to  pass  without  search  or  interruption  to  New  York.  The  entire 
remaining  British  forces  were  surrendered  to  the  allies — the  land  army 
with  its  munitions  of  war  to  the  Americans,  and  the  marines  to  the 
French.2 

End  of  the  Seven  Years'  Tragedy. — Exultation,  and  gratitude  to  the  God 
of  nations,  broke  forth  from  every  heart  wherever  the  news  flew.  Every- 
where the  entire  population  rushed  to  the  temples  of  God,  to  offer  Up  their 
thanksgivings  for  the  deliverance  of  his  people.8  The  cause  of  Indepen- 
dence was  now  regarded  as  virtually  won.  The  exhausted  patriot  soldiers, 
flushed  with  victory,  had  to  stand  to  their  arms  only  a  short  time  longer, 

1  The   Capitulation.  —  '  Of  prisoners,  there  were  yet  could  not  but  feel  how  decisive  was  their  defeat.'— 

seven  thousand  two  hundred  and  forty-seven  of  regu-  Bancroft,  vol.  x.  pp.  522,  523. 

lar  troops,  the  flower  of  the  British  army  in  America,  2  Mrs.  Emma  Willard's  admirable  History  of  thi 

besides  eight  hundred  and  forty  sailors.    The  British     United  States, 

loss  during  the  siege  amounted  to  more  than  three  hun-  3  A  messenger,  with  a  dispatch  from  Washington, 

dred  and  fifty.     A   hundred  and  six  guns  were  taken,  reached   Philadelphia  at  midnight.     Soon  the  watch- 

of  which  seventy-five  were  brass.     The  land  forces  and  men  in  the  streets   cried,   'Past  twelve   o'clock,  and 

stores  were  assigned  to  the  Americans,  the  ships  and  Cornwallis  is  taken.'     Before  dawn  the  exulting  peo- 

mariners  to  the  French.     At  four  o'clock  in  the  after-  pie  filled  the  streets  ;  and  at  an  early  hour  Secretary 

noon   of  the  nineteenth,   Cornwallis  remaining   in  his  Thompson  read   that  cheering  letter  to  the  assembled 

tent,  Major-General  O'Hara  marched  the  British  army  Congress.     Then  that  august  body  went  in  procession 

past  the  lines  of  the  combined  armies,  and,  not  without  to  a  temple  of  the  living  God— Oct.  24th,  1781— and 

signs  of  repugnance,  made  his  surrender  to  Washing-  there  joined  in   public   thanksgivings   to  the  King  of 

ton.     His  troops  then  stept  forward  decently  and  piled  kings   for  the  great  victory.     They  also  resolved  that 

their  arms  on  the  ground.  a  marble  column  should  be  erected   at  Yorktown,  to 

'Nor    must    impartial    history  fail    to    relate    that  commemorate  the  event;  and  that  two  stands  of  col- . 

the  French  provided  for  the  siege  of  Yorktown  thirty-  ors  should  be  presented  to  Washington,  and  two  pieces 

seven  ships  of  the  line,  and  the  Americans  not  one  ;  of  cannon   to  each  of  the   French  commanders,   Ro- 

that    while    the    Americans    supplied   nine   thousand  chambeau  and  De  Grasse. — Lossing's  History  of  the 

troops,    of   whom   fifty-five    hundred    were    regulars,  United  States,  p.  342. 

the  contingent  of  the  French  consisted  of  seven  thou-  When  the  letters  of  Washington,   announcing  the 

sand.  capitulation,    reached  Congress,  that  body,  with   the 

'  Among  the  prisoners  were  two  battalions  of  Ans-  people  streaming  in  their  train,  went  in  procession  to 

pach,  amounting  to  ten  hundred  and  seventy-seven  the  Dutch  Lutheran  Church,  to  return  thanks  to  Al- 

men  ;  and  two  regiments  of  Hesse,  amounting  to  eight  mighty  God.     Every  breast  swelled  with  joy.     In  the 

hundred  and  thirty-three.     On  the  way  to  their  camp,  evening   Philadelphia   was    illuminated  with    greater 

they  passed  in  front  of  the  regiment  of  Deux  Ponts.  splendor  than   at  any   time    before.     Congress  voted 

At  the  sight  of  their  countrymen,  they  forgot  that  they  honors  to  Washington,    to    Rochambeau,    and    to  De 

had  been  in  arms  against  each  other,  and  embraced  Grasse,  with  special  thanks  to  the  officers  and  troops, 

with  tears  in  their  eyes.     The  English  soldiers  affected  A  marble  column  was  to  be  erected  at  Yorktown,  with 

to  look  a-  the  allied   army  with  scorn.     Their  officers,  emblems  of  the  alliance  between  the  United  States  and 

oi  more    iflection,  conducted  themselves  with  decorum,  his  most  Christian  Majesty.' — Bancroft, vol.  x.  p.  523. 


DISBANDING  THE  CONTINENTAL  ARMY.  4*7 

for  the  foe  had  been  humbled.  The  right  of  man  to  self-government  had 
been  triumphantly  asserted,  and  the  battles  of  the  American  Revolution  had 
all  been  fought. 

Disbanding  of  the  Continental  Arjny. — Two  events  portending  serious 
evils  now  occurred.  The  American  army  was,  of  course,  to  be  disbanded. 
This  had  been  found  one  of  the  most  hazardous  and  difficult  steps  for  a  nation 
to  take  at  any  period.  Officers  long  accustomed  to  command,  and  soldiers  who 
generally  become  corrupt  and  vicious  in  the  licentiousness  of  war,  and  the 
idleness  of  the  camp,  have  a  disinclination  to  return  to  the  arts  of  peace  and 
the  pursuits  of  industry. 

The  arrears  of  the  army  had  not  yet  been  paid  by  Congress,  and  discon- 
tent from  this  cause  was  on  the  point  of  breaking  out  into  sedition.  The 
army  was  lying  at  Newburg,  when  it  was  discovered  that  a  plot  was  on  foot 
to  march  to  the  national  Capitol,  and  demand  justice  from  Congress,  with 
arms  in  their  hands.  This  plot  would  have  been  executed  had  not  Washing- 
ton discovered  it  in  time,  and  offered  such  monitions  to  its  leaders  as  no  other 
man  could  give.  He  pledged  himself  to  write  to  Congress  on  their  behalf, 
if  they  would  abandon  their  design,  and  he  fulfilled  his  promise.  Congress 
acted  with  promptness  and  efficiency.  Half  pay  had  been  pledged,  but  it  was 
commuted  to  full  pay  for  five  years.  Everything  was  wisely  and  well  done, 
and  the  American  army  was  peacefully  disbanded. 

The  Crown  offered  to  Washington. — About  the  same  time,  a  general  of  the 
army  and  some  of  his  associates  in  the  campaigns  of  the  Revolution,  after 
long  and  frequent  conferences  together,  addressed  a  letter  to  Washington, 
persuading  him  to  encourage  the  establishment  of  a  monarchy,  of  which  he  was 
to  be  the  head.  There  was  no  treason  or  treachery  in  this.  Men's  ideas  at 
that  time  were  by  no  means  so  democratic  as  they  are  now.  *  Accustomed, 
as  the  colonists  had  been,  to  wild  and  rude  forms  of  liberty,  no  considerable 
portion  of  the  American  people  were  fully  prepared  for  the  immediate  adop- 
tion of  such  forms  of  government,  or  the  enactment  of  such  statutes  as  have 
since  become  inevitable  wherever  new  American  States  have  sprung  into  ex- 
istence. It  should  never  be  forgotten  that  when  the  colonists  first  took  up 
arms  against  the  throne,  they  did  not  contemplate  the  sovereignty  and  inde- 
pendence of  these  States.  They  limited  their  purposes  solely  to  resistance  to 
aggression  on  their  civil  rights  as  British  subjects.  It  was  only  after  much 
American  blood  had  been  spilt  by  the  soldiers  of  George  III.,  that  the  country 
was  prepared  for  severing  all  connection  between  the  colonies  and  the  crown  ; 
and  now  that  the  Revolution  was  over,  and  men  began  to  turn  their  thoughts 
to  the  form  of  government  which  should  be  adopted,  there  were  very  few 
Americans  whose  ideas  were  matured  enough  to  adopt  a  system  of  govern- 
ment like  the  one  under  which  the  Union  was  at  last  founded.  Monarchical 
notions  and  prejudices  still  prevailed  ;  and  it  may  be  somewhat  doubtful 
whether  a  monarchical  form  might  not  have  been  adopted  in  substance,  had 
Washington  thrown  his  influence  in  that  direction.  History  was  full  of  pre- 
27 


418       EFFECT  IN  EUROPE  OF  CORNWALLIS  SURRENDER. 

cedents  to  justify  him  in  such  a  course ;  for,  from  Caesar  to  Cromwell,  the 
leaders  of  nations,  who  had  achieved  great  glory  or  independence,  had  almost 
invariably  grasped  at  monarchical  power,  under  the  pretext  of  preserving  what 
had  been  won,  or  of  gratifying  the  feelings  of  their  countrymen.  I  therefore 
think  we  should  attach  more  importance  than  some  have,  to  the  fact  that 
from  the  moment  this  suggestion  was  made  to  Washington,  he  not  only  re- 
fused his  concurrence,  but  immediately  replied  that  'he  viewed  such  ideas 
with  abhorrence,  and  he  must  reprehend  them  with  severity.'  ■  From  that 
moment  the  thought  was  no  longer  entertained  by  a  human  being  ;  and 
although  Europeans  regarded  this  refusal  of  a  throne  as  a  most  wonderful 
display  of  modesty  and  patriotism,  yet  no  man  who  comprehends  the  charac- 
ter of  Washington,  supposes  it  ever  could  have  been  possible  for  him,  even  for 
a  moment,  to  entertain  the  idea  of  accepting,  much  less  usurping  regal  power. 


SECTION  SEVENTH. 

PEACE. 

How  the  News  of  the  Surrender  of  Carnwallis  was  received  in  Europe. — 
"  The  Duke  de  Lauzun,  chosen  to  take  the  news  across  the  Atlantic,  arrived 
in  twenty-two  days  at  Brest,  and  reached  Versailles  on  the  nineteenth  of  No- 
vember. The  king,  who  had  just  been  made  happy  by  the  birth  of  a  dauphin, 
received  the  glad  news  in  the  queen's  apartment  The  very  last  sands  of 
the  life  of  Count  de  Maurepas  were  running  out ;  but  he  could  still  recognize 
de  Lauzun,  and  the  tidings  threw  a  halo  round  his  death-bed.  The  joy  at 
Court  penetrated  the  whole  people,  and  the  name  of  Lafayette  was  pro- 
nounced with  veneration.  '  History,'  said  Vergennes,  f  offers  few  examples  of 
a  success  so  complete.'  '  All  the  world  agree,'  wrote  Franklin  to  Washing- 
ton, ^that  no  expedition  was  ever  better  planned,  or  better  executed.  It 
brightens  the  glory  that  must  accompany  your  name  to  the  latest  posterity.' 

"  The  first  tidings  of  the  surrender  of  Cornwallis  reached  England  from 
France  about  noon  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  November.  '  It  is  all  over,'  said 
Lord  North  many  times,  under  the  deepest  agitation  and  distress.2  Fox — to 
whom,  in  reading  history,  the  defeats  of  armies  of  invaders,  from  Xerxes'  time 
downwards,  gave  the  greatest  satisfaction— heard  of  the  capitulation  of  York- 
town  with  wild  delight.     He  hoped  that  it  might  become  the  principle  of  all 

1  •  Sir,'  said  he,  in  reply  to  the  officer  through  whom  ceived  in  the  knowledge  of  myself,  you  could  not  have 

the  communication  was  sent,  with  a  mixture  of  surprise  found  a  person- to  whom  your  schemes  are  more  dis- 

and  astonishment,  '  I  have  read  with  attention  the  sen-  agreeable.     .     .     .     < 

timents  you  have  submitted  to  my  perusal.     Be  assur-  '  Let  me  conjure  you,  then,  if  you  have  any  regard 
ed,  sir.  no  occurrence  in  the  course  of  the  war  has  given  for  your  country,  concern  for  yourself  or  posterity,  or 
me  more  painful  sensations  than  your  information  of  respect  for  me,    to  banish  these  thoughts  from  your 
there  being  such  ideas  existing  in  the  army  as  you  mind,  and  never  communicate  as  from  yourself  or  any 
have  expressed,  and  which  I  must  view  with  abhorrence,  one  else  a  sentiment  of  the  like  nature, 
and  reprehend  with  severity.  For  the  present,  the  com-  *  I  am.  Sir,  &c, 
munication  of  them  will  rest  in  my  own  bosom,  unless  'George  Washington.' 
some  further  agitation  of  the  matter  shall  make  a  dis-          3  Lord  George  Germain  said  that  Lord  North  re- 
closure  necessary.     I  am  at  muchloss  to  conceive  what  ceived  the  intelligence  *  as  he  would  have  done  a  cannon- 
part  of  my  conduct  could  have  given  encouragement  ball  in  his  breast'     He  paced  the  room,  throwing  his 
to  an  address  which  to  me  seems  big  with  the  greatest  arms  wildly  about,  and  kept  exclaiming,  'O  God  !  it  is 
mischiefs  that  can  befall  my  country.    If  I  am  not  de-  all  over,  it  is  all  over  1 ' — Lossing's  Hist.  U.  S.,  p.  345. 


LORD  SHELBOURNKS  LETTER  TO  FRANKLIN.  4*9 

mankind,  that  power  resting  on  armed  force  is  invidious,  detestable,  weak,  and 
tottering.  The  official  report  from  Sir  Henry  Clinton  was  received  the  same 
day  at  midnight.  When  on  the  following  Tuesday,  Parliament  came  together, 
the  speech  of  the  king  was  confused,  the  debates  in  the  two  houses  argued  an 
impending  change  in  the  opinion  of  Parliament,  and  the  majority  of  the 
ministry  was  reduced  to  eighty-seven.  A  fortnight  later  the  motion  of  Sir 
James  Lowther,  to  give  up  'all  further  attempts  to  reduce  the  revolted 
colonies,'  was  well  received  by  the  members  from  the  country,  and  the  ma- 
jority of  the  ministry  after  a  very  long  and  animated  debate,  dwindled  to  forty- 
one.  The  city  of  London  entreated  the  king  to  put  an  end  to  '  this  unnatu- 
ral and  unfortunate  war.'  Such,  too,  was  the  wish  of  public  meetings  in 
Westminster,  in  Southwark,  and  in  the  counties  of  Middlesex  and  Surrey. 
The  House  of  Commons  employed  the  recess  in  grave  reflection.  The  chimes 
of  the  Christmas  bells  had  hardly  died  away  when  the  king  wrote,  as  stub- 
bornly as  ever  :  '  No  difficulties  can  get  me  to  consent  to  the  getting  of 
peace  at  the  expense  of  a  separation  from  America.' 

"  Yet  Lord  George  Germain  was  compelled  to  retire  ingloriously  from  the 
Cabinet.  It  was  sought  to  palliate  his  disgrace  with  a  peerage ;  but  as  he 
crossed  the  threshold  of  the  House  of  Lords,  he  was  met  by  the  unsparing 
reprobation  of  his  career  of  cowardice  and  blindly  selfish  incapacity."  ■ 

Lord  Shelbourne 's  Letter  to  Franklin,  preliminary  to  Negotiations  for 
Peace. — '  London,  6th  April,  1782. — Dear  Sir  :  I  have  been  favored  with  your 
letter,  and  I  am  much  obliged  by  your  remembrance.  I  find  myself  returned 
nearly  to  the  same  situation  which  you  remember  me  to  have  occupied  nine- 
teen years  ago  ;  and  I  should  be  very  glad  to  talk  to  you  as  I  did  then,  and 
afterwards  in  1767,  upon  the  means  of  promoting  the  happiness  of  mankind, 
a  subject  much  more  agreeable  to  my  nature  than  the  best  concerted  plans 
for  spreading  misery  and  devastation.  I  have  had  a  high  opinion  of  the  com- 
pass of  your  mind,  and  of  your  foresight.  I  have  often  been  beholden  to  both, 
and  shall  be  glad  to  be  so  again,  as  far  as  is  compatible  with  your  situation. 
Your  letter,  discovering  the  same  disposition,  has  made  me  send  to  you  Mr. 
Oswald.  I  have  had  a  longer  acquaintance  with  him  than  even  with  you.  I 
believe  him  an  honorable  man,  and  after  consulting  some  of  our  common 
friends,  I  have  thought  him  the  fittest  for  the  purpose.  He  is  a  pacifical  man, 
and  conversant  in  those  negotiations  which  are  most  interesting  to  mankind. 
This  has  made  me  prefer  him  to  any  of  our  speculative  friends,  or  to  any  per- 
son of  high  rank.  He  is  fully  apprised  of  my  mind,  and  you  may  give  full 
credit  to  anything  he  assures  you  of.  At  the  same  time,  if  any  other  channel 
occurs  to  you,  I  am  ready  to  embrace  it.  I  wish  to  retain  the  same  simplicity 
and  good  faith  which  subsisted  between  us  in  transactions  of  less  importance. 

1  Shelbourne.' 

Tlie  Resolution  for  Peace  in  Parliament  carried,  February  21th,  1782. — 
'The  day  following  Edmund  Burke  wrote  to  Franklin  :  '  I  congratulate  you  as 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  x.  p.  523-525. 


420  PRELIMINARY  ARTICLES  TO  PEACE. 

the  friend  of  America  ;  I  trust  not  as  the  enemy  of  England  ;  I  am  sure  as 
the  friend  of  mankind  ;  the  resolution  of  the  Mouse  of  Commons,  carried  in  a 
very  full  house,  was,  I  think,  the  opinion  of  the  whole.  I  trust  it  will  lead  to 
a  speedy  peace  between  the  two  branches  of  the  English  nation.' 

George  the  Third's  Feelings. — u  The  king  kept  his  sorrows  as  well  as  he 
could,  pent  up  in  his  own  breast,  but  his  mind  was  '  truly  torn  to  pieces '  by 
the  inflexible  resolve  of  the  House  of  Commons  to  stop  the  war  in  America. 
He  blamed  them  for  having  lost  the  feelings  of  Englishmen.  Moreover,  he 
felt  keenly  '  the  cruel  usage  of  all  the  powers  of  Europe,'  of  whom  every 
one  adhered  to  the  principles  of  the  armed  neutrality,  and  every  great  one 
but  Spain,  desired  the  perfect  emancipation  of  the  United  States."  * 

Preliminary  Articles  to  a  Treaty  of  Peace  signed  at  Versailles,  November 
30,  1782. — With  the  expectation  of  soon  receiving  overtures,  Congress  clothed 
with  powers  of  negotiation,  Benjamin  Franklin,  John  Adams,  John  Jay,  and 
Henry  J.  Laurens,  who  had  already  acted  as  the  American  agents  in  Europe. 
As  the  further  prosecution  of  the  war  had  been  rendered  impossible  in  con- 
sequence of  the  public  feeling  in  Great  Britain,  the  ministry  signified  their 
willingness  to  open  negotiations  for  peace  ;2  and  on  the  30th  of  November, 
1782,  preliminary  articles  were  signed  at  Versailles,  on  the  basis  of  the  final 
treaty,  which  was  not  executed  until  the  following  September,  it  being  neces- 
sary for  England  to  adjust  her  affairs  with  France,  who  had  been  a  party  to 
the  war.  During  the  preceding  April,  John  Adams  had  procured  from  Hol- 
land the  recognition  of  our  independence.  On  the  8th  of  the  following 
October  he  negotiated  a  treaty  of  amity  and  commerce,  and  rendered  an  im- 
mense service  to  his  country  by  procuring,  soon  after,  a  considerable  loan, 
which  replenished  the  exhausted  American  treasury,  and  enabled  the  govern- 
ment to  begin  to  recover  from  its  deep  financial  prostration. 

Proclamation  of  Peace. — On  the  19th  of  April,  just  eight  years  after  the 
battle  of  Lexington,  which  sounded  the  tocsin  of  the  Revolution,  peace  was 
proclaimed  by  Washington,  from  the  head-quarters  of  the  American  army. 
In  the  general  orders  cessation  of  hostilities  was  to  be  proclaimed  at  noon 
on  the  following  day,  and  read  in  the  evening  at  the  head  of  every  regiment 
and  corps  of  the  army,   '  after  which,  the  chaplains  with  the  several  brigades 

1  Bancroft,  vol.  x.  p.  533.  *  Friends  of  Franklin  gathered  around  him,  and  as 
*  The  Treaty  of  Peace,  November  30,  1782.— 'On  the  Duke  of  Rochefoucauld  kissed  him  for  joy,  "My 
the  twenty-ninth,  Strachey,  Oswald,  and  Fitzherbert,  friend,"  said  Franklin,  "could  I  have  hoped  at  such  an 
on  the  one  side,  and  Jay,  Franklin,  Adams,  and,  for  age  to  have  enjoyed  so  great  happiness."  ' 
the  first  time,  Laurens,  on  the  other,  came  together  for  '  For  the  United  States  the  war,  which  began  by  an 
their  last  word,  at  the  apartments  of  Jay.  The  AmerL-  encounter  with  a  few  husbandmen  embattled  on  Lexing- 
can  commissioners  agreed  that  there  should  be  no  fu-  ton  Green,  ended  with  their  independence,  and  posses- 
ture  confiscations  jior  prosecutions  of  loyalists  ;  that  all  sion  of  all  the  country  from  the  St.  Croix  to  the  south- 
pending  prosecutions  should  be  discontinued  ;  and  that  western  Mississippi,  from  the  Lake  of  the  Woods  to 
Congress  should  recommend  to  the  several  States  and  the  St.  Mary.  In  time  past  republics  have  been  con- 
their  legislatures,  on  behalf  of  the  refugees,  amnesty,  fined,  to  cities  and  their  dependencies,  or  to  small  can- 
and  the  restitution  of  their  confiscated  property.'  .  .  .  tons;  and  the  United  States  avowed  themselves  able 
'  On  the  thirtieth,  the  commissioners  of  both  coun-  to  fill  a  continental  territory  with  commonwealths.'— 
tries   signed   and   sealed   fair  copies   of    the    conven-  Bancroft,  vol,  x,  pp.  589-592. 


WASHINGTON  PARTING    WITH  HIS  OFFICERS.  421 

wih  render  thanks  to  Almighty  God  for  all  his  mercies,  particularly  for  hia 
overruling  the  wrath  of  man  to  his  own  glory,  and  causing  the  rage  of  war  to 
cease  among  the  nations.'  '  The  generous  task  for  which  we  first  flew  to 
arms  being  accomplished  ;  the  liberties  of  our  country  being  fully  acknow- 
ledged, and  firmly  secured,  and  the  characters  of  those  who  have  perse- 
vered through  every  extremity  of  hardship,  suffering,  and  danger  being  im- 
mortalized by  the  illustrious  appellation  of  the  patriot  army,  nothing  now  re- 
mains, but  for  the  actors  of  this  mighty  scene  to  preserve  a  perfect  unvarying 
consistency  of  character  through  the  very  last  act,  to  close  the  drama  with 
applause,  and  to  retire  from  the  military  theatre  '  with  the  same  approbation 
of  angels  and  men  which  has  crowned  all  their  former  virtuous  actions.' a 

The  Foreign  Invaders  leave  the  Soil. — The  British  troops  began  their 
march  from  the  interior,  and  clustered  along  the  coast,  preparatory  to  their 
embarkation  for  England.  Finally,  on  the  25  th  of  November,  the  British 
army  evacuated  New  York.  While  they  were  going  on  board  their  ships  which 
lay  in  the  bay,  the  patriot  troops  entered  the  city  amidst  universal  rejoicings.' 

Washington's  Farting  with  his  Officers. — The  time  now  came  for  Washing- 
ton to  perform  a  final  act,  which  completed  the  sublime  unity  of  his  character, 
and  the  perfection  of  his  fame.  On  the  4th  of  December  he  parted  from 
his  officers  at  New  York  amidst  scenes  of  tenderness  and  grief  which  have 
seldom  been  witnessed,  where  subalterns  have  bid  adieu  to  their  military 
chieftain.    In  his  Life  of  Washington,  Irving  thus  speaks  :  "  In  the  course  of 

1  In  a  letter  from  Washington  to  Congress  on  the  eve  Fishkill  Ferry,  and  there  formed   an  association  which 

of  his  proclaiming  peace  to  the  army,  we  find  the  spirit  they  named  the   Society  of   the  Cincinnati.     The 

of  the  true  soldier  in  the  affection  he  expressed  for  his  chief  objects  of  the  society  were    to  promote  cordial 

comrades.      '  One  suggestion  of  his  letter  is  expressive  friendship  and  indissoluble  union  among  themselves  ; 

of  his  strong  sympathy  with  the  patriot  soldier,  and  to  commemorate  by  frequent  reunions,  the  great  strug- 

his  knowledge  of  what  formed  a  matter  of  pride  with  gle  they  had  just  passed  through  ;  to  use  their  best 

the  poor  fellows  wh  >  had  served  and  suffered  under  endeavors  for  the    promotion   of   human    liberty  ;  to 

him.     He  urged  that,  in  discharging  those  who  had  cherish  good  feeling  between  the  respective  States  ;  and 

been  engaged    'for  the  war,'   the   non-commissioned  to  extend  benevolent  aid  to  those  of  the   society  whose 

officers  and   soldiers  should  be  allowed  to  take  with  circumstances  might  require  it.     They  formed  a  Gene- 

them,  as  their  own  property,  and  as  a   gratuity,  their  ral  Society  and  elected  Washington  its  first  president, 

arms  and   accoutrements.     'This  act,'   observes  he,  They  also  made  provision  for  the  formation  of  auxili- 

'  would  raise  pleasing  sensations  in  the  minds  of  these  ary  State  societies.     To  perpetuate  the  association,  it 

worthy  and  faithful  men,  who,  from  their  early  engag-  was  provided  in  the  constitution,  that  the  eldest  male 

ing  in  the  war  at  moderate  bounties,  and  from  their  descendant  of  an  original  member  should  be  entitled  to 

patient    continuance    under    innumerable     distresses,  bear  the  Order  and  enjoy  the  privileges  of  the  society, 

have  not  only  deserved  nobly  of  their  country,  but  The  Order  consists  of  a  gold  eagle,  suspended  upon 

have  obtained  an  honorable  distinction  over  those  who,  a  ribbon,  on  the  breast  of  which  is  a  medallion  with  a 

with   shorter  terms,   have   gained  large   pecuniary  re-  device  representing  Cincinnatus  receiving  the  Roman 

wards.     This,  at  a  comparatively  small  expense,  would  senators.'— Lossing^  Hist.  U.  S.,  pp.  352,  353. 
be  deemed  an  honorable  testimonial  from  Congress  of  3  '  The  British  army  evacuated  the  city    of  New 

the  regard  they  bear  to  these  distinguished  worthies,  York  on  the  25th  of  November,  1783.     With  their  de- 

and  the  sense  they  have  of  their  suffering,  virtues,  and  parture,   went  forever,   the  last    instrument    of   royal 

services power  in  these  United  States.     On  the  morning  of  that 

'These  constant  companions  of  their  toils,  preserved  day,  a  cold,  frosty,  but  clear  and  brilliant  morning — 

with  sacred  attention,  would  be  handed  down  from  the  the  American  troops,  undet  General   Knox,  who  had 

present  possessors  to  their  children  as  honorary  badges  come  down  from  West  Point  and  encamped  at  Harlem, 

of  bravery  and  military  merit ;  and  would  probably  be  marched  to   the  Bowery  Lane,  and  halted  at  the  pre^ 

brought  fnrth  on  some  future  occasion  with  pride  and  sent  junction  of  Third  Avenue  and  the  Bowery.  Knox 

exultation,  to  be  improved  with  the  same  military  ardor  was    accompanied  by  George    Clinton,    the    governor 

and  emulation  in  the  hands  of  posterity,  as  they  have  of  the  State  of  New  York,  with  all  the  principle  offi- 

>een  used  by  their  forefathers  in  the  present  establish-  cers.     There  they  remained  until  about  one  o'clock  in 

ment  and  foundation  of  our  national  independence  and  the  afternoon,  when  the  British  left  their  posts  in  thai 

glory.' — Irving's  Life  of  Washington,  pp.  421,  422.  vicinity  and   marched    to  Whitehall.      The   American 

2  Some    notice    should   be   taken  of  the  founding  troops  followed,  and  before  three  o'clock  General  Knox 

Society  ok  the  Cincinnati  : —  took  formal  possession  of  Fort  George,  amid  the  ac- 

'Afew  months  before  the  final  disbanding  of  the  clamations  of  thousands  of  emancipated  freemen,  and 

army,  many  of  the  officers   then  at  Newburg,  on  the  the  roar  of  artillery  upon  the  battery.' — Ibid.,  pp,  350, 

Hudson,  met  (June  19,  1783),  at  the  head-quarters  of  351. 
the  Baron  Steuben,  situated  about  two  miles  from  the 


422  WASHINGTON  RESIGNS  HIS   COMMISSION. 

a  few  days,  Washington  prepared  to  depart  for  Annapolis,  where  Congress 
was  assembling,  with  the  intention  of  asking  leave  to  resign  his  command. 
A  barge  was  in  waiting  about  noon  on  the  4th  of  December,  at  Whitehall 
ferry,  to  convey  him  across  the  Hudson  to  Paulus  Hook.  The  principal  of- 
ficers of  the  army  assembled  at  Frances'  Tavern,  in  the  neighborhood  of  the 
ferry,  to  take  a  final  leave  of  him.  On  entering  the  room,  and  finding  himself 
surrounded  by  his  old  companions  in  arms,  who  had  shared  with  him  so  many 
scenes  of  hardship,  difficulty,  and  danger,  his  agitated  feelings  overcame  his 
usual  self-command.  Filling  a  glass  of  wine,  and  turning  upon  them  his  be- 
nignant but  saddened  countenance,  '  With  a  heart  full  of  love  and  gratitude,' 
said  he,  '  I  now  take  leave  of  you,  most  devotedly  wishing  that  your  lat- 
ter days  may  be  as  prosperous  and  happy  as  your  former  ones  have  been  glo- 
rious and  honorable.'  Having  drunk  this  farewell  benediction,  he  added, 
with  emotion,  ■  I  cannot  come  to  each  of  you  to  take  my  leave,  but  I  will  be 
obliged  if  each  of  you  will  come  and  take  me  by  the  hand.'  General  Knox, 
who  was  the  nearest,  was  the  first  to  advance.  Washington,  affected  even  to 
tears,  grasped  him  by  his  hand,  and  gave  him  a  brother's  embrace.  In  the  same 
affectionate  manner  he  took  leave  severally  of  the  rest.  Not  a  word  was 
spoken.  The  deep  feeling  and  manly  tenderness  of  these  veterans  in  the 
parting  moment,  could  not  find  utterance  in  words.  Silent  and  •  solemn  they 
followed  their  loved  commander  as  he  left  the  room,  passed  through  a  corps 
of  light  infantry,  and  proceeded  on  foot  to  Whitehall  ferry.  Having  entered  the 
.barge  he  turned  to  them,  took  off  his  hat  and  waved  a  final  adieu.  They  re- 
plied in  the  same  manner,  and  having  watched  the  barge  until  the  intervening 
point  of  the  Battery  shut  it  from  sight,  returned  still  solemn  and  silent  to  the 
place  where  they  had  assembled."  x 

Washington  resigns  his  Commission,  December  23,  1783. — Having  made 
known  his  intention  to  resign  his  commission  as  commander-in-chief  of  the 
armies  of  the  United  States,  Washington  proceeded  to  Annapolis a  where  Con- 
gress was  then  in  session.  A  day  was  set  apart  with  every  sign  of  respect  for 
the  solemn  business  to  be  transacted.  The  chamber  was  crowded  with  illus- 
trious men  from  foreign  countries,  veterans  of  the  Revolution,  and  distin- 
guished citizens,  who  had  flocked  together  from  every  quarter,  to  witness  the 
simple  but  imposing  ceremony.  After  the  preliminary  proceedings  were 
over,  the  President  announced  to  General  Washington  that  Congress  was 
prepared  to  receive  from  him  any  communication  he  deemed  proper  to  make. 
The  great  man  rose,  and  with  that  modesty  which  so  eminently  distinguished 
him,  uttered  the  following  words  : 

*  Mr.  President  :  The  great  events  on  which  my  resignation  depended, 

1  Vol.  iv.  p.  440.     ^  dresses  by  legislative  assemblies  and  learned  and  reli- 

■  In  speaking  of  this  journey  from  New  York  to  An-  gious   institutions.      He   accepted    them   all  with   the 

napolis,  where  he  was  to  resign  his  commission,  Irving  modesty  inherent  in  his  nature,  little  thinking  that  this 

»ay?  :    '  In   passing  through  New  Jersey,  Pennsylva-  present  popularity  was  but  the  early  outbreaking  of  a 

ma,  and  Maryland,  the  scenes  of  his  anxious  and  pre-  fame  that  was  to  go  on  widening  and  deepening  from 

carious  campaigns,  Washington  was  everywhere  hailed  generation  to  generation,    and  extending  over  the  whole 

with  enthusiasm  by  the  people,  and  greeted  by  ad-  civilized  world.'—  Irving' s  Ibid.,  p.  42a. 


HIS  PARTING  WORDS  TO  CONGRESS.  423 

having  at  length  taken  place,  I  now  have  the  honor  of  offering  my  sincere  con. 
gratulations  to  Congress,  and  of  presenting  myself  before  them,  to  surrender 
into  their  hands  the  trust  committed  to  me,  and  to  claim  the  indulgence  of 
retiring  from  the  service  of  my  country. 

*  Happy  in  the  confirmation  of  our  independence  and  sovereignty,  and 
pleased  with  the  opportunity  afforded  the  United  States  of  becoming  a  re- 
spectable nation,  I  resign  with  satisfaction  the  appointment  I  accepted  with 
diffidence ;  a  diffidence  in  my  abilities  to  accomplish  so  arduous  a  task  ; 
which  however  was  superseded  by  a  confidence  in  the  rectitude  of  our  cause, 
the  support  of  the  supreme  power  of  the  Union,  and  the  patronage  of 
Heaven. 

1  The  successful  termination  of  the  war  has  verified  the  most  sanguine 
expectations;  and  my  gratitude  for  the  interposition  of  Providence,  and  the 
assistance  I  have  received  from  my  countrymen,  increases  with  every  review 
of  the  momentous  contest. 

1  While  I  repeat  my  obligations  to  the  army  in  general,  I  should  do  in- 
justice to  my  own  feelings  not  to  acknowledge  in  this  place,  the  peculiar 
services  and  distinguished  merits  of  the  gentlemen  who  have  been  attached 
to  my  person  during  the  war.  It  was  impossible  the  choice  of  confidential 
officers  to  compose  my  family  should  have  been  more  fortunate.  Permit  me, 
sir,  to  recommend  in  particular,  those  who  have  continued  in  the  service  to 
the  present  moment,  as  worthy  of  the  favorable  notice  and  patronage  of 
Congress. 

'  I  consider  it  an  indispensable  duty  to  close  this  last  act  of  my  official 
life,  by  commending  the  interests  of  our  dearest  country  to  the  protection  of 
Almighty  God,  and  those  who  have  the  superintendence  of  them,  to  His  holy 
keeping. 

'Having  now  finished  the  work  assigned  me,  I  retire  from  the  great 
theatre  of  action ;  and,  bidding  an  affectionate  farewell  to  this  august  body, 
under  whose  orders  I  have  long  acted,  I  here  offer  my  commission,  and 
take  my  leave  of  all  the  employments  of  public  life.'  l 

He  laid  his  commission  upon  the  table,  and  handed  his  sword  to  the 
President.  The  deepest  emotions  shook  every  bosom,  and  when  the  chief- 
tain sat  down,  he  was  hailed  as  the  Cincinnatus  of  tjje  new  world.  He 
shortly  after  retired  to  his  home  on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac,  with  an  ampler 
and  more  enduring  fame,  than  had  ever  followed  a  political  deliverer  to  his 
retirement. 

1  Few  tragedies  ever  drew  so  many  tears  from  so    his  Excellency  took  his  final  leave  of  Congress.— Ed* 
many  beautiful  eyes  as  the  moving  manner  in  which    tor  of  The  Maryland  Gazette. 


424  UNDER  THE  ARTICLES  OF  CONFEDERATION. 


SECTION  EIGHTH. 


UNDER   THE   ARTICLES    OF    CONFEDERATION. 

Here  for  a  while  we  leave  the  Cincinnatus  of  the  New  World,  on  his  waj 
to  Mount  Vernon,  his  heart  filled  with  irrepressible  longings  for  the  home  he 
had  visited  but  once  during  an  eight-years'  war,  and  then  only  when  it  lay 
directly  on  his  way  to  Yorktown,  with  Count  Rochambeau,  who  for  a  few 
hours  became  his  guest. 

We  must  glance  very  rapidly  over  the  next  six  years,  for  they  witnessed 
few  stirring  events.  During  this  period,  the  States  were  held  together,  as 
they  had  been  since  1777,  by  the  articles  of  confederation,  which,  al- 
though they  secured  for  the  time  all  the  objects  they  were  intended  to  promote, 
could  not  promise  for  the  future  security,  union,  or  repose.  The  time  which 
elapsed  from  the  peace  of  '83  to  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution  in 
'89,  was  occupied  by  the  nation  chiefly  in  the  patient  work  of  recovering  from 
the  devastations  and  consequent  embarrassments  of  a  protracted  war.  In  the 
life  of  our  nation,  this  period  resembles  those  days  of  listlessness  and  repose, 
which  prevail  in  camps  after  great  victories,  rather  than  the  activity  and 
collisions  which  often  attend  the  establishment  of  new  forms  of  government. 

The  Colonies  had  achieved  their  independence,  and  for  a  while  were  satis- 
fied with  the  liberty  they  had  won.  It  was  long  before  they  clearly  perceived, 
and  profoundly  felt,  the  necessity  of  consolidating  institutions  which  would 
secure  to  them  and  their  children  the  enjoyment  of  their  great  heritage.  This 
is  by  no  means  to  be  regretted;  for  such  institutions  as  they  established 
never  could  have  been  the  work  of  an  hour.  They  were  the  fruit  of  vast 
political  experience,  and  the  maturest  reflection.  They  have  excited  the 
astonishment  of  the  world,  and  been  studied  and  admired  most  profoundly  by 
the  greatest  statesmen  who  have  lived  since.  Charles  James  FoxJ  and 
Napoleon  Bonaparte,  regarded  the  American  Constitution  as  the  wisest 
system  of   civil  government  that  had  ever   been  established ;    nor  are  we 

'Dealing,  as  we  are,   with,  the  utmost  brevity  on  King  John,  and  along  succession  of  acts  of  Parliament, 

nearly  all  subjects  glanced  at  in  this  history,  we  should  The  principles  of  liberty  have  been  brought  out  and  as- 

reluctantly  omit  to  pay  a  passing  tribute  to  the  great  serted,  from  time  to  time,  in   the  memorable  proceed- 

services  which  Charles  James   Fox  rendered   to   the  ings  of  the  Parliament.     These  transactions  and  enact- 

cause  of  American  liberty  while  the  Revolution  was  in  ments  constitute  the  great  lights  which  illuminate   the 

progress,  and  after  it  had  reached  its  successful  con-  history  of  civil  liberty.     The  powerlessness  of  a  British 

summation.      Fox  was,  beyond  question,   among  the  monarch  has  passed   into  a  proverb — he  is  little  more 

most  enlightened  an  J  sagacious  of  British  statesmen,  than  a  magnificent  pageant  in  a  great  system.     Fox  de- 

In  depth  of  heart,  and  apparent  earnestness  of  convic-  veloped    perspicuously  these    ideas,  and    made    them 

tion,  he  was  so  distinguished  that  he  won  the  attention  familiar   to  the  public  mind  ;  although   they   seemed 

and  confidence  of  the  world.     As  a  statesman,  he  was  strange  things  on  their  first  announcement, 

characterized  by  great  forecast  and  comprehension,  and  Fox  contended  vigorously  and  consistently  against 

was  one  of  the  first  men  to  give  permanent  impulses  to  the  extreme  views  of  the  king  and  of  the  high  Tory 

the  popular  tendencies  and  elements  inherent  in   the  party  ;  and  in  the  great  change  in  the  regal  part  of  the 

Briush  system  of  government  :  while  by  his  ability  and  British  Government,  he  certainly  had  a  predominant 

•loquance  he  contributed  largely  to  the  vindication  of  agency.     Even  when  he  failed  to  get  a  majority  on  his 

these  tend  mcies  and  elements.     He  did  more  than  any  side,  he  generally  succeeded    in  establishing  a  prece- 

other  man  to  neutralize  the  will  of  the  king  in  matters  of  dent.     Moreover,    his   mind  is   this    day   shaping    the 

government,  and  establish  the  constitution  of  the  em-  course  of  British  statesmanship.     Fox  s  views  on  the 

pire  on  its  true  parliamentary  basis.     The  constitution  American  question  at  last  prevailed,  and  thus  his  op- 

of  Great  Britain  is  historical.     It  is  to  be  found  in  the  ponents  were  compelled  to  acknowledge    :hat  he  had 

records  of  England   for  a  thousand  years.     Its  great  been  right  all  the  time. — Essay  on  the  Statesmanship 

landmarks  are  in   the  Magna  Charta,  extorted  from  of  Charles  James  Fox,  by  C  Edwards  Lester.     1850, 


SIGNERS  TO  THE  ARTICLES  OF  CONFEDERATION.        425 

aware  that  any  public  man.  of  eminence  in  any  nation,  has  called  that  judg- 
ment in  question.     Of  what  other  system  can  this  be  said  ? 

The  Articles  of  Confe deration. — It  is  not  necessary  to  reprint  them.  They 
were  agreed  to  by  the  delegates  of  the  thirteen  original  States,  in  Congress 
assembled,  on  the  15th  of  November,  1777.  They  were  ratified  by  eight 
States  on  the  9th  of  July,  1778  ;  and  finally,  by  all  the  States  on  the  1st  of 
March,  1781,  according  to  the  dates  which  are  affixed  against  their  names,  as 
given  below.     The  binding  clause  at  the  close  of  the  articles  was  as  follows  : — 

And  Whereas,  It  hath  pleased  the  Great  Governor  of  the  World  to  incline 
the  hearts  of  the  legislatures  we  respectfully  represent  in  Congress,  to  ap- 
prove of,  and  to  authorize  us  to  ratify  the  said  articles  of  confederation  and 
perpetual  union  :  know  ye  that  we,  the  undersigned  delegates,  by  virtue  of 
the  power  and  authority  to  us  given  for  that  purpose,  do  by  these  presents, 
in  the  name,  and  in  behalf  of  our  respective  constituents,  fully  and  entirely 
ratify  and  confirm  each  and  every  of  the  said  articles  of  confederation  and 
perpetual  union,  and  all  and  singular  the  matters  and  things  therein  con- 
tained. And  we  do  further  solemnly  plight  and  engage  the  faith  of  our  re- 
spective constituents,  that  they  shall  abide  by  the  determination  of  the  United 
States,  in  Congress  assembled,  on  all  questions  which  by  the  said  confedera- 
tion are  submitted  to  them  j  and  that  the  articles  thereof  shall  be  inviolably 
observed  by  the  States  we  respectfully  represent,  and  that  the  union  shall  be 
perpetual.  In  witness  whereof,  we  have  hereunto  set  our  hands  in  Congress. 
Done  at  Philadelphia,  in  the  State  of  Pennsylvania,  the  9th  day  of  July,  in  the 
year  of  our  Lord,  1778,  and  in  the  third  year  of  the  Independence  of  America. 


Josiah  Bartlett, 

John  Hancock, 
Samuel  Adams, 
Elbridge  Gerry, 

William  Ellery, 
Henry  Marchant, 

Roger  Sherman, 
Samuel  Huntington, 
Oliver  Wolcott, 

James  Duane, 
Francis  Lewis, 

John  Witherspoon, 

Robt.  Morris, 

Daniel  Roberdean, 

Jona.  Bayard  Smith, 

Tho.  M'Kean,  Feb.  12,  1779, 

John  Dickenson,  May  5,  1779. 


John  Wentworth,  jun., 

August  8th,  1778. 
Francis  Dana, 
James  Lowell, 
Samuel  Holten, 

John  Collins, 

Titus  Hosmer, 
Andrew  Adams, 

William  Duer, 
Gouverneur  Morris, 

Nathaniel  Scudder, 

William  Clingan, 
Joseph  Reed, 

22d  July,  1778. 
Nicholas  Van  Dyke, 


)  On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
)      State  of  New  Hampshire. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Massachusetts  Bay. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Rhode  Island  and 
Providence  Plantations. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Connecticut. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  New  York. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  New  Jersey,  No- 
vember 26th,  1772. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  cf  the 
State  of  Pennsylvania. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Delaware. 


426 


EVILS  OF  A  MERE  CONFEDERACY. 


John  Hanson,  March  1st,  1781,     Daniel  Carroll, 

March  1st,  1781. 

Richard  Henry  Lee, 
John  Banister, 
Thomas  Adams, 

JohnPenn,  July  21st,  1778, 


Jno.  Harvie, 

Francis  Light  foot  Lee, 


Cornelius  Harnett, 
Jno.  Williams, 
Richard  Hutson, 
Thos.  Hey  ward,  jun., 


Henry  Laurens, 
William  Henry  Drayton, 
John  Matthews, 

Jonas  Walton,  24th  July,  1778,     Edwd.  Telfair, 

Edwd.  Lang  worthy 


On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Maryland. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Virginia. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  North  Carolina. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  South  Carolina. 

On  the  part  and  behalf  of  the 
State  of  Georgia. 


'The  times  that  tried  men's  souls  are  over/  wrote  the  author  of  ■  Common 
Sense,'  and  the  greatest  and  completest  revolution  the  world  ever  knew 
is  gloriously  and  happily  accomplished  .  .  .  That  which  .  .  renders  easy  all 
inferior  concerns  is  the  Union  of  the  States  ...  I  ever  feel  myself  hurt  when 
I  hear  the  Union — that  great  palladium  of  our  liberty  and  safety — the  least 
irreverently  spoken  of.  It  is  the  most  sacred  thing  in  the  Constitution  of 
America,  and  that  which  every  man  should  be  the  most  proud  and  tender  of. 
Our  citizenship  in  the  United  States,  is  our  national  character.  Our  citizen- 
ship in  any  particular  State,  is  only  our  local  distinction.  By  the  latter,  we  are 
known  at  home  ;  by  the  former  to  the  world  Our  great  title  is  Americans  ; 
our  inferior  one,  varies  with  the  place.'  l 

"  The  times  of  trial  were  by  no  means  over.  To  construct  the  Republican 
Government,  represented  by  the  press  as  easy,  proved  the  hardest  of  work. 
On  the  return  of  peace,  the  need  of  it  was  more  painfully  felt  than  ever.  The 
great  Minister  of  Finance,  Robert  Morris,  engaged  in  mighty  labors,  wrote  : 
'  The  necessity  of  strengthening  our  confederacy,  providing  for  our  debts,  and 
forming  some  Federal  Constitution,  begins  to  be  most  seriously  felt.  But  un- 
fortunately for  America,  the  narrow  and  illiberal  prejudices  of  some  have 
taken  such  deep  root,  that  it  must  be  difficult,  and  may  prove  impracticable 
to  remove  them."  3 

The  Evils  of  a  mere  Confederacy.— -They  at  last  became  intolerable. 
The  country  was  falling  into  inanition — bordering  on  anarchy.  In  the  pre- 
sence of  a  foreign  enemy,  the  nation  was  willing  to  submit  to  the  edicts  of  the 
Continental  Congress.  But  now  its  recommendations  were  unheeded.  The 
treasury  was  empty,  and  there  was  no  national  authority  to  impose  taxation 
to  replenish  it.  Our  European  debt,  principal  and  interest,  remained  unpaid. 
We  had  indeed  achieved  our  Independence,  but  we  had  established  no 
government.  The  conviction  became  universal  that  a  great  work  had  still  to 
be  done.     The  nation  woke  up  to  achieve  it. 

»  The  Last  Crisis,  No.  xiii.  a  Frothingham's  Rise  of  the  Republic^  p.  583. 


ADOPTION  OF  THE  NATIONAL  CONSTITUTION.  427 


SECTION  NINTH. 

THE   ADOPTION   OF  THE   NATIONAL   CONSTITUTION. 

The  Constitutional  Co?ivention. — Its  delegates  had  been  elected  and  sum- 
moned to  meet  at  Independence  Hall,  in  Philadelphia,  on  the  14th  of  May, 
1787;  and  on  that  day  the  Fathers  of  the  Republic  began  to  gather  around 
the  old  national  altar  on  which  the  fires  of  liberty  were  still  burning. 

Washington  unanimously  elected  to  preside  over  its  Deliberations. — 
Only  one  other  man  could  have  been  thought  of :  but  Franklin  had  now  grown 
old,  and  '  he  desired  to  see  his  friend,  George  Washington,  Esquire,  take  the 
chair.'  It  was  declared  to  be  the  unanimous  desire  of  the  Assembly.  Mr. 
Madison  tells  us  that  after  being  escorted  to  the  seat,  *  he  thanked  the  Con- 
vention in  a  very  emphatic  manner  for  the  honor  they  had  conferred  on  him ; 
reminded  them  of  the  novelty  of  the  scene  of  business  in  which  he  was  to 
act ;  lamented  his  want  of  better  qualifications,  and  claimed  the  indulgence 
of  the  house  toward  the  involuntary  errors  which  his  inexperience  might  occa- 
sion.' "A  majority  of  the  States  not  having  been  represented  in  the 
beginning,  those  present  had  adjourned  from  day  to  day  until  the  twenty-fifth, 
when  Washington  was  called  on  to  preside.  Sixty-five  delegates  had  been 
chosen ;  ten,  however,  did  not  take  their  seats.  The  credentials,  generally, 
were  like  those  of  Virginia,  which  named  as  the  object,  to  devise  '  such 
further  provisions  as  may  be  necessary  to  render  the  Federal  Constitution 
adequate  to  the  exigencies  of  the  Union.'  " 

'The  members  were  identified  with  the  heroic  and  wise  counsels  of  the 
Revolution.  The  venerable  Franklin  had  been  in  the  Albany  Convention, 
and  now,  at  eighty-one,  was  the  President  of  Pennsylvania.  Johnson,  of 
Connecticut,  Rutledge,  of  South  Carolina,  and  Dickinson  were  in  the  Stamp 
Act  Congress.  Seven  of  the  delegates  were  in  the  Congress  of  1774.  Eight 
of  them  signed  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  one  of  whom,  James  Wilson, 
was  next  to  Madison  in  ability,  culture,  and  preparation  for  the  work  before 
them.  Eighteen  were  then  members  of  Congress,  and  only  twelve  had  not 
been  members  of  that  body.  Among  the  great  men  who  were  elected,  but 
declined,  were  Richard  Caswell  and  Patrick  Henry.  The  delegates  most 
distinguished  by  revolutionary  service,  were  Langdon,  Gerry,  Sherman, 
Livingston,  Read,  Mifflin,  Morris,  Clymer,  Wilson,  Mason,  Wythe,  Rutledge, 
Randolph,  the  two  Pinckneys,  Madison,  Hamilton,  Dickinson,  Franklin,  and 
Washington.  Of  those  who  were  destined  to  be  widely  known,  were  Rufus 
King,  Caleb  Strong,  Nathaniel  Gorham,  Oliver  Ellsworth,  Jared  Ingersoll, 
and  James  McHenry.  This  roll  of  names  marks  the  rank  of  this  Assembly 
as  to  intellect,  character,  experience,  and  patriotism.'  ' 

1  Frothingham's  Rise  of  the  Republic,  pp.  589,  590. 


428  DIFFICULTIES  TO  BE  OVERCOME. 

It  was  proposed,  at  first,  merely  to  amend  the  Articles  of  Confederation 
under  which  the  national  government  had  till  that  time  been  administered  ; 
but  after  consultation  and  debate  it  was  decided  to  throw  aside  the  old  sys- 
tem altogether,  and  proceed  to  the  business  of  forming  a  Constitution.  This 
Convention,  which  will  forever  be  known  as  that  of  the  framers  of  the 
Constitution,  embraced  almost  every  really  great  man  in  the  nation  who 
could  be  spared  from  our  foreign  service,  or  the  administration  of  the  local 
affairs  of  the  States.  « 

The  Difficulties  to  Overcome. — Very  few  men  of  our  times  have  any  ade- 
quate conception,  either  how  numerous  or  how  great  were  the  obstacles 
the  Framers  of  the  Constitution  had  to  contend  with.  They  were  almost 
invincible,  and  they  sometimes  appeared  quite  so.  In  fact,  at  one  time,  the 
chances  of  Union  were  so  small,  that  several  members  proposed  a  final  ad- 
journment. At  this  momentous  crisis  Dr.  Franklin  rose  and  said  : — "  In 
this  situation  of  the  Assembly,  groping,  as  it  were,  in  the  dark,  to  find  politi- 
cal truth,  and  scarce  able  to  distinguish  it  when  presented  to  us, — how  has  it 
happened,  sir,  that  we  have  not  hitherto  once  thought  of  humbly  applying  to 
the  Father  of  Light  to  illuminate  our  understandings  ?  In  the  beginning  of 
the  contest  with  Britain,  when  we  were  sensible  of  danger,  we  had  daily 
prayers  in  this  room  for  the  Divine  protection.  Our  prayers,  sir,  were  heard, 
— and  they  were  graciously  answered.  All  of  us  who  were  engaged  in  the 
struggle,  must  have  observed  frequent  instances  of  a  superintending  Provi- 
dence in  our  favor.  To  that  kind  Providence  we  owe  this  happy  opportunity 
of  consulting  in  peace,  on  the  means  of  establishing  our  future  national  feli- 
city. And  have  we  now  forgotten  that  powerful  Friend  ?  or  do  we  imagine 
we  do  no  longer  need  His  assistance  ?  I  have  lived,  Sir,  a  long  time  ;  and 
the  longer  I  live  the  more  convincing  proofs  I  see  of  this  truth, — that  God 
governs  in  the  affairs  of  men.  And  if  a  sparrow  cannot  fall  to  the  ground 
without  His  notice,  is  it  probable  that  an  empire  can  rise  without  His  aid  ? 
We  have  been  assured,  sir,  in  the  Sacred  Writings,  that  *  except  the  Lord 
build  the  house  ;  they  labor  in  vain  that  build  it.'  I  firmly  believe  this  ;  and 
I  also  believe  that,  without  His  concurring  aid,  we  shall  succeed  in  this  poli- 
tical building  no  better  than  the  builders  of  Babel ;  we  shall  be  divided  by  our 
little,  partial,  local  interests  ;  our  projects  will  be  confounded,  and  we  our- 
selves shall  become  a  reproach  and  a  byword  down  to  future  ages.  And, 
what  is  worse, — mankind  may  hereafter,  from  this  unfortunate  instance,  despair 
of  establishing  government  by  human  wisdom,  or  leave  it  to  chance,  war, 
and  conquest." 

The  veteran  Christian  philosopher  then  moved  that  •  Henceforth  prayers 
imploring  the  assistance  of  Heaven,  and  its  blessings  on  our  deliberations, 
be  held  in  this  Assembly  every  morning,  before  we  proceed  to  business.'  The 
resolution  was  adopted ;  clergymen  were  invited  to  officiate  ;  greater  har- 
mony prevailed  in  the  Convention  ;  and  so  visible  was  the  guidance  of  illumi- 
nated wisdom  from  that  hour,  that  the  most  skeptical  were  confounded,  while 


A  NEW  CREATION  OF  STATESMANSHIP.  429 

the  hearts  of  the  despairing  began  to  beat  to  new  inspirations  of  hope.     The 
founders  went  straight  forward  to  the  glorious  termination  of  their  labors.1 

A  New  Creation  of  Statesmanship. — Wise  and  patriotic  as  these  men 
were,  they  could  not  all  see  alike ;  and  from  diversity  of  education,  habits, 
prejudices,  and  original  endowments,  wide  differences  in  opinion  about  gov- 
ernment plight  have  been  expected  to  prevail.  But  there  was  a  still  more 
efficient  cause  for  difference.  The  members  of  that  Convention  were 
creating  a  govermnent  of  a  new  order  among  men,  and  they  derived  less 
light  or  aid  than  is  generally  supposed  from  the  free  States  of  antiquity,  or  of 
modern  times.  The  Confederations,  so  called,  of  the  Greek  States,  the 
Italian  Leagues,  or  the  German  States,  offered  few  or  no  precedents  to  guide 
them.  Theirs  was  a  work  of  creation,  and  not  of  imitation.  It  seemed  not 
only  difficult,  but  impossible,  to  clothe  a  Federal  Government  with  authority 
enough  to  embrace  the  attributes  necessary  to  the  administration  of  supreme 
power,  without  impairing  the  independence  and  sovereignty  of  the  separate 
States.  Strictly  speaking,  it  was  impossible.  But  the  Constitution  was 
framed  upon  principles  of  fair  compromise  and  wise  adjustment :  and  powers 
as  definitely  described,  and  as  nicely  and  equitably  adjusted  as  possible,  were 
given  to  the  Central  Government ;  and  they  have  been  found,  on  a  discreet 
and  dispassionate  construction  of  the  Constitution,  to  allow  the  sovereignty 
of  each  State  to  remain  entire  for  all  practical  purposes,  while  the  National 
Government  has  been  enabled  to  move  on  quietly  in  peace — irresistible  in 
war.8  Its  founders  intended  to  construct  a  government  strong  enough  to 
protect  itself,  and  secure  the  rights  of  all  its  citizens  :  and  as  Webster  said, 
it  made  every  provision  for  such  modifications  as  experience  might  call  for, 
— none  whatever  for  its  subversion. 

'The  Convention  was  occupied  for  nearly  four  months — May  25  to  Sept. 
1 7 — in  its  great  labor.  Its  sessions  were  held  with  closed  doors  ;  secrecy  was 
enjoined,  no  member  being  even  allowed  to  copy  from  its  journal ;  and  little 
transpired  of  its  proceedings  until  its  adjournment.  Its  journal  was  intrusted 
to  the  keeping  of  Washington,  who  deposited  it  in  the  State  Department. 
It  was  printed  by  direction  of  Congress  in  18 18.  Robert  Yates,  one  of  the 
members  from  New  York,  made  short  notes  of  the  debates  in  the  earlier  ses- 
sions, which  were  printed  in  182 1  ;  and  Madison  took  short-hand  notes  of 
each  day's  doings,  which  he  wrote  out  daily.  They  were  printed  in  1840. 
Luther  Martin,  in  a  remarkable  letter  addressed  to  the  legislature  of  Mary- 

1  During  this  period  Franklin  made  his  well-known  giving  to  each  State  one  representative  for  every  forty 

impressive  speech,  on  introducing  a  molion  that  prayers  thousand    inhabitants,    and  to    each   State    an    equal 

be  said  in  the  Convention.     In  another  characteristic  vote  in  the  Senate.—  Frothingham's  Rise  of  the  Repub- 

speech  on  the  wide  diversity  of   opinion,  he  said  that  lie,  pp.  592,  593. 

when  a  broad  table  is  to  be  made,  and  the  edges  of  2  De  Tocqueville,  among  foreigners,  perhaps  under- 
planks  do  not  fit,  the  artist  takes  a  little  from  both  and  stood  this  matter  best:  while  Marshall,  Story,  Web- 
makes  a  good  joint.  In  like  manner,  here  both  sides  ster,  Kent,  and  Curtis  have  given  those  interpretations 
must  part  with  some  of  their  demands,  in  order  that  which  have  settled  permanently  the  letter  and  spirit  of 
they  may  join  in  some  accommodating  proposition,  our  written  Constitution.  No  reader  will  suspect  me 
The  work  of  healing  commenced  when  the  compromise  — least  of  all  in  a  work  of  this  kind — of  attempting  to 
was  agreed  to,  fixing  the  basis  of  representation  by  enter  into  any  disquisition  on  this  subject.  I  only 
adding  t  >  the  whole  number  of  free  persons,  including  accept  as  final  the  teachings  of  the  mighty  jurists  I 
those  bomd  to  serve  for  a  term  of  years,  excluding  have  reverently  named. 
Indians  not  taxed,  three-fifths  of  all  other  persons,  and 


43°  THE  THREE  INEVITABLE  PARTIES  AMONG  MEN. 

land,  gave  important  information  concerning  the  Convention.  These  and 
other  authentic  materials  1  furnish  nearly  a  complete  view  of  the  process  by 
which  the  Constitution  for  the  United  States  was  matured.' 9 

The  Three  inevitable  Parties  among  Men. — As  might  have  been  clearly 
foreseen,  that  great  body  embraced  the  three  parties  into  which  men  will 
always  be  divided  in  free  governments, — the  same  lines,  in  fact,  which  divide 
men  in  the  whole  system  of  social  life  :  lines  cut  by  nature,  and  never  effaced 
by  time.  The  first,  those  who  advocated  a  very  strong  central  government, 
invested  with  more  power  and  authority  than  might  consist  with  the  exercise 
of  the  first  attributes  of  independence  in  the  States.  They  were  called 
Federalists? .  Hamilton  was  their  leader.  The  second  party  was  made  up  of 
men  who  advocated  somewhat  extreme  views  of  State  sovereignty,  and  who 
were  jealous  of  a  strong  central  government.  They  were  known  as  Anti- 
Federalists  at  the  time ;  but  soon  after,  they  called  themselves  the  Republi- 
can Party.  This  party  was  headed  by  Jefferson,  and  ~  sixteen  years  later  it 
carried  him  to  the  presidency,  and  maintained  him  there  with  increasing 
influence  for  two  presidential  terms.  A  large  number  of  the  members  of  the 
Convention,  however,  held  moderate  opinions  in  regard  to  these  matters ; 
and  after  protracted,  profound,  and  learned  discussions,  they  succeeded  in 
moderating  the  views  of  the  other  two  parties  to  such  an  extent,  that  there  was 
great  harmony  in  the  adoption  of  the  principles  and  policy  which  lie  at  the 
bottom  of  the  Constitution.4     The  Convention  was  aware  that  the  colonial 

1  Elliott's  Debates,  ed.  1866,  i.  121-123,  contains  '  Sir,  I  agree  to  this  Constitution,  with  all  its  faults, 
an  account  of  these  materials.  This  work  is  an  invalu-  — if  they  are  such — because  I  think  a  general  Govern- 
able repository  of  the  papers  connected  with  the  forma-  ment  necessary  for  us,  and  there  is  no  form  of  Govem- 
tion  of  the  Constitution.  ment  but  what  may  be  a  blessing  to  the  People,  if  well 

2  Frothingham's  Rise  of  the  Republic,  pp.  590,  591.  administered  ;  and  I  believe  further,  that  this  is  likely 

3  Federalists. — A  political  party  in  ihe  United  to  be  well  administered  for  a  course  of  years,  and  can 
States  who  claimed  to  be  the  peculiar  friends  of  the  only  end  in  despotism,  as  other  forms  have  done  before 
Constitution  and  of  the  Federal  government.  Their  it,  when  the  people  shall  become  so  corrupted  as  to 
opponents,  the  Republicans,  they  called  Anti-Federal-  need  despotic  government,  being  incapable  of  any  other, 
ists,  and  charged  them  to  a  certain  extent  with  hos-  I  doubt,  too,  whether  any  other  convention  we  can  ob- 
tility  to,  or  distrust  of,  the  United  States  Constitu-  tain  may  be  able  to  make  a  better  Constitution.  For, 
tion  and  the  general  government.  The  Republicans,  when  you  assemble  a  number  of  men,  to  have  the  ad- 
however,  strenuously  denied  the  truth  of  these  charges,  vantage  of  their  joint  wisdom,  you  inevitably  assemble 
The  Federalist  party  was  formed  in  1788.  Its  most  with  those  men  all  their  prejudices,  their  passions,  their 
distinguished  leaders  were  Washington,  Adams,  Ham-  errors  of  opinion,  their  local  interests,  and  their  selfish 
ilton,  Jay,  and  Marshall ;  and  the  leading  Federalist  views.  From  such  an  assembly  can  a  perfect  produc- 
States  were  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut,  supported  tion  be  expected?  It  therefore  astonishes  me,  sir,  to 
generally,  though  not  uniformly,  by  the  rest  of  New  find  this  system  approaching  so  near  to  perfection  as  it 
England;  while  Jefferson,  Madison,  Monroe,  Burr,  does;  and  I  think  it  will  astonish  our  enemies,  who  are 
George  Clinton,  and  Gallatin  led  the  opposition.  In  waiting  with  confidence  to  hear  that  our  counsels  are 
the  contests  of  the  French  revolution  the  Federalists  confounded,  like  those  of  the  builders  of  Babel,  and 
leaned  to  the  side  of  England,  the  Republicans  to  that  that  our  States  are  on  the  point  of  separation,  only  to 
of  France.  The  former  were  defeated  in  the  Presiden-  meet  hereafter  for  the  purpose  of  cutting  one  another's 
tial  election  of  1800,  when  the  Republican  candidates  throats. 

were  elected— Jefferson,  President,  and  Burr,  Vice-  'Thus,  I  consent,  sir,  to  this  Constitution,  because 
President.  Their  opposition  to  the  war  of  1812,  and,  I  expect  no  better,  and  because  I  am  not  sure  that  this 
above  all,  the  calling  of  the  Hartford  Convention,  com-  is  not  the  best.  The  opinions  I  have  had  of  its  errors 
pleted  their  destruction  as  a  national  party.  In  1816,  I  sacrifice  to  the  public  good.  I  have  never  whispered 
Monroe,  the  Republican  candidate  for  President,  re-  a  syllable  of  them  abroad.  Within  these  walls  they 
ceived  the  electral  votes  of  all  the  States  with  the  ex-  were  born,  and  here  they  shall  die.  If  every  one  of  us, 
ception  of  Massachusetts,  Connecticut,  and  Delaware,  in  returning  to  his  constituents,  were  to  report  the  ob- 
which  gave  34  votes  against  him,  while  from  the  other  jections  he  has  had  to  it,  and  endeavor  to  gain  parti- 
States  he  received  183.  At  the  next  election,  in  1820,  sans  in  support  of  them,  we  might  prevent  its  being 
the  Federalist  party  was  disbanded,  Monroe  receiving  generally  received,  and  thereby  lose  all  the  salutary  ef- 
every  electoral  vote  except  one. — American  Cyclo-  fects  and  great  advantages  resulting  naturally  in  our 
paedia^  voL  vii.  p.  108.     1874.  favor  among  foreign  nations,  as  well  as  among  ourselves, 

4  The  final  remarks  of  Franklin  in  the  Convention  from  our  real  or  apparent  unanimity.  Much  of  the 
show  the  broad  national  spirit  which  actuated  the  whole  strength  and  efficacy  of  any  government,  in  procuring 
body  ;  while  they  strikingly  display  the  leading  traits  and  securing  happiness  to  the  people,  depends  on  opin- 
of  Franklin's  character, — his  liberality,  practical  wis-  ion. — on  the  general  opinion  of  the  goodness  of  that 
dam,  and  spirit  of  compromise  : —  government,  as  well  as  of  the  wisdom  and  integrity  oi 


SLA  VER  Y  FIRST  MAKES  TR  O  UBLE.  43 1 

experience  of  the  States  had  made  them  jealous  of  the  power  of  a  strong 
central  government,  and  that  they  would  be  keenly  sensitive  on  this  subject. 

The  First  Slavery  Trouble}  — But  a  more  formidable  difficulty  perhaps  ex- 
isted in  the  adjustment  of  the  slavery  question.  There  were  upwards  of  six 
hundred  thousand  slaves — chiefly  in  the  Southern  States — at  the  time  the  Con- 
stitution was  framed.  Thus  early  did  this  always-irritating  question  obtrude 
itself  upon  legislative  attention  ;  and  then,  as  ever,  its  discussion  was  at- 
tended by  frequent  and  deep  irritation.  Local  prejudices  and  sectional 
feelings  are  the  most  dangerous  and  difficult  obstructions  to  the  union  and 
prosperity  of  confederated  commonwealths  ;  and  we  may  trace  to  them  the 
dismemberment  of  many  powerful  empires.  In  the  Northern  States  slaver) 
existed  in  so  mild  a  form,  and  the  number  of  the  slaves  was  so  inconsidera 
ble,  that  there  was  a  jealousy  among  the  northern  members  of  the  Conven 
tion  against  allowing  the  slave  population  to  be  taken  into  consideration 
as  a  basis  for  taxation  or  representation  in  the  national  government.  At 
one  time  things  went  so  far  that  the  best  friends  of  the  Union  despaired  of 
the  result ;  but,  at  length,  a  compromise  was  settled  on,  by  which,  in  fixing  the 
quota  of  taxation  and  representation,  the  entire  body  of  slaves  was  allowed  to 
come  in,  in  the  proportion  of  three-fifths  for  every  constituency ;  so  that  in 
the  national  government  five  slaves  were  reckoned  as  three  white  citizens. 
There  was,  moreover,  another  clause — Section  II.  Article  IV. — which  pledged 
the  public  faith  to  the  rendition  of  fugitive  slaves.  Without  this  clause  it  is  not 
believed  the  South  would  have  come  into  the  Union.  It  was  on  this  ground 
that  Daniel  Webster,  the  ablest  exponent  of  the  Constitution  that  has  lived, 
gave  his  hearty  assent  to  the  reaffirmation  of  this  clause  when  it  became  neces- 
sary to  embrace  it  in  the  Compromise  Measures  of  1850.     '  I  find  it/  said  he, 

*  in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  I  am  prepared  to  abide  by  it.' 

The  great  Work  completed. — The  framers  of  the  Constitution  had  at  last 
completed  their  great  work,2  and  it  was  sent  forth  for  the  adoption  of  the 

its  governors.      I  hope,   therefore,  that,   for  our  own  petent  to  solve  the  problem  ;  and  so  early  as  1782,  in 

sakes,  as  a  part  of  the  people,  and  for  the  sake  of  our  the  helplessness  of  despair,   he  dismissed  it  from  his 

posterity,  we  shall  act  heartily  and   unanimously   in  thoughts  as  a  practical  question,   with  these  words  : 

recommending  this  Constitution,  wherever  our  influence  '  I  tremble  for  my  country  when  I  reflect  that  God  is 

may  extend,  and  turn  our  future  thoughts  and  endeav-  just,  that  his  justice  cannot  sleep  forever.     The  way,  I 

ors  to  the  means  of  having  it  well  administered.  hope,    is   preparing,   under  the  auspices  of  Heaven, 

1  Views  of  Jefferson  and  Washington  on  Negro  for  a  total  emancipation.' 
Slavery,  in  1782. — In  May,  1782,  just  thirteen  years  At  that  time  Washington  was  a  kind  and  consider- 
after  Jefferson  had  brought  in  a  bill  giving  power  of  ate  master  of  slaves,  without  as  yet  a  title  to  the  char- 
unconditional  emancipation  to  the  masters  of  slaves,  acter  of  abolitionist.  By  slow  degrees  the  sentiment 
the  measure  was  adopted  by  the  Legislature  of  Vir-  grew  up  in  his  mind  that  to  hold  men  in  bondage  was 
ginia.  Under  this  act  more  slaves  received  their  a  wrong  ;  that  Virginia  should  proceed  to  emancipa- 
frecdom  than  were  liberated  in  Pennsylvania  or  in  Mas-  tion  by  general  statute  of  the  State  ;  that  if  she  refused 
sachusetts.  Even  had  light  broken  in  on  Jefferson's  to  do  so,  each  individual  should  act  for  his  own  house- 
mind  through  the  gloom  in  which  the  subject  was  in-  hold. — Bancroft,  vol.  x.  pp.356,  357. 
volved  for  him,  Virginia  would  not  have  accepted  from  Methodists  on  Slavery. — It  remains  to  be  related, 
him  a  plan  for  making  Virginia  a  free  commonwealth  ;  that  in  the  year  1780,  the  Methodists  of  the  United 
but  there  is  no  evidence  that  he  ever  reconciled  himself  States,  at  their  general  meeting,  voted  'slave-keeping 
to  the  idea  of  emancipated  black  men  living  side  by  side  contrary  to  the  laws  of  God,  man,  and  nature.' — Ibid., 
with  while  men  as  equal  sharers  in  political  rights  and  vol.  x.  p.  370. 

duties  and  powers.     The  result  of  his  efforts  and  re-         2  All  the  members  signed  the  Constitution,  excepting 

flections  he  uttered   in   these    ominous    forebodings  :  Edmund    Randolph  and  George  Mason,  of  Virginia, 

*  Nothing  is  more  certainly  written  in  the  book  of  fate  and  Elbridge  Gerry,  of  Massachusetts.  Whilst  the  last 
than  that  these  people  are  to  be  free  ;  nor  is  it  less  members  were  signing,  Franklin,  the  Nestor  of  the 
certain  that  the  two  races,  equally  free,  cannot  live  in  Assembly,  looking  towards  the  President's  chair,  at  the 
the  same  government.'  back  of  which  a  rising  sun  happened  to  be  painted,  ob- 

In  bondage  to  these  views,  Jefferson  was  not  com-    served  to  a  few  members  near  him,  that  painters  had 


432 


THE  CONSTITUTION  AT  LAST  COMPLETED. 


States.  By  some  it  was  adopted  without  any  delay.  By  others  it  was  long 
and  thoroughly  discussed  ;  and  although  it  finally  received  the  concurrence 
of  all,  yet  it  is  not  to  be  denied  that  there  was  a  great  lack  of  unanimity 
among  the  citizens  of  all  the  States  in  giving  their  adhesion  to  an  untried 
system.  There  was  apprehension  lest  in  its  workings,  some  evils  might  be 
discovered  which  had  eluded  the  eyes  of  its  framers  ;  but  the  provision  which 
was  made  in  the  Constitution  itself  for  subsequent  amendments,  obviated, 
in  the  main,  these  objections.1 — The  Constitution  went  into  effect  j  all  its 
results  have  been  beneficent.  To  it  we  owe  all  we  have  of  tranquillity  at 
home,  and  respect  and  influence  abroad.  Time  has  vindicated  the  political 
wisdom  of  its  framers,  and  inspired  for  them,  in  the  heart  of  every  American, 
the  deepest  and  most  enduring  veneration.3 


found  it  difficult  to  distinguish  in  their  art  a  rising  from 
a  setting  sun.  '  I  have,'  said  he,  'often  and  often,  in 
the  course  of  the  session,  and  the  vicissitudes  of  my 
hopes  and  fears  as  to  its  issue,  looked  at  that  behind 
the  President,  without  heing  able  to  tell  whether  it  was 
rising  or  setting  ;  but  now,  at  length,  I  have  the  hap- 
piness to  know  that  it  is  a  rising  and  not  a  setting  sun.' 
The  instrument  was  attested  in  the  form  submitted  by 
him  :  '  Done  in  Convention,  by  the  unanimous  consent 
of  the  States  present,  the  17th  day  of  September,  in 
the  year  of  our  Lord  1787,  and  of  the  Independence  of 
the  United  States  of  America  the  twelfth.' — Frothing- 
ham's  Rise  0/  the  Republic,  p.  596. 

4  The  local  legislatures  followed  the  example  of  Con- 
gress. Without  expressing  any  opinion  on  the  Con- 
stitution, they  called  upon  the  people  to  choose  dele- 
gates in  the  manner  in  which  they  chose  representa- 
tives to  meet  in  Convention  and  take  it  into  considera- 
tion, and  report  the  result  to  the  Congress  of  the  United 
States.  These  conventions  accordingly  were  held,  and 
the  Constitution  and  accompanying  papers  were  laid 
before  them.  After  long  debates  they  voted  to  ratify 
the  Constitution.' — Ibid.,  p.  599. 

More  than  a  year  elapsed  before  the  requisite  num- 
ber of  States  had  ratified  it.  It  was  done  in  the  follow- 
ing order: — 

1787. 

Delaware,  December  7.     Pennsylvania,  Decem- 
ber 12.     New  Jersey,  December  18. 
1788. 

Georgia,  January  2.  Connecticut,  January  9. 
Massachusetts,  February  6.  Maryland,  April  28. 
South  Carolina,  May  23.  New  Hampshire.  June 
21.  Virginia,  June  26.  New  York,  July  26.  North 
Carolina,  November  21. 

1790. 

Rhode  Island,  May  29. 

1  The  founders  of  the  Republic  left  it  as  ther  dying 
injunction  to  cherish  the  Union.  Washingtom  embo- 
died their  spirit  in  his  farewell  address,  in  which  he  pre- 
sents it  as  the  palladium  of  political  safety  and  pros- 
perity. Andrew  Jackson  gave  expression  to  the  deter- 
mined will  of  the  nation  in  the  terse  sentiment  spoken 
at  the  right  time,  '  The  Federal  Union,  it  must  be  pre- 
served.' Abraham  Lincoln  the  martyr-president,  said 
that  the  thousands  who  died  for  their  country  on  the 
late  battle-fields  gave  their  lives  '  that  the  nation  might 
live,'  and  '  that  governments  of  the  people,  by  the  peo- 
ple, and  for  6  ie  people,  should  not  perish  from  the  earth.1 

In  the  language  of  one  of  these  Presidents  :  "  It  is 
not  in  a  splendid  government  supported  by  aristocratic 
establishments  that  the  people  will  find  happiness  or 
their  liberties  protection  ;  but  in  a  plain  system,  void 
of  pomp — protecting  all  and  granting  favors  to  none, — 
dispensing  its  blessings  like  the  dews  of  heaven,  un- 
seen and  unfelt  save  in  the  freshness  and  beauty  they 


contribute  to  produce.  It  is  such  a  government  that 
the  genius  of  our  people  requires, — such  a  one  only  un- 
der which  our  States  may  remain  for  ages  to  come, 
united,  prosperous,  and  free." — Ibid.,  p.  610. 

9  Thus  was  the  work  of  the  Revolution  at  length 
accomplished  by  the  embodiment  of  the  ideas  of  local 
self-government  and  of  national  union  in  the  Constitu- 
tion as  the  organic  law,  and  the  establishment  of  a 
republican  government  that  met  the  wants  of  the  nation. 

This  result  was  hailed  with  joy  by  men  of  liberal 
views  all  over  the  world.  The  feeling  of  this  school 
was  expressed  by  Mackintosh  as  he  wrote:  "Amer- 
ica has  emerged  from  her  struggle  into  tranquillity  and 
freedom,  into  affluence  and  credit :  and  the  authors  of 
her  Constitution  have  constructed  a  great  permanent 
experimental  answer  to  the  sophisms  and  declarations 
of  the  detractors  of  liberty."  Lord  Brougham  wrote, 
in  1853,  of  the  effects  of  the  Revolution,  with  the  es- 
tablishment of  this  government  :  "  It  animated  free- 
dom all  over  the  world  to  resist  oppression.  It  gave  an 
example  of  a  great  people  not  only  emancipating  them- 
selves, but  governing  themselves  without  even  a  mon- 
arch to  control  or  an  aristocracy  to  restrain  them  ;  and 
it  demonstrated,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  contrary  to  all  the  predictions  of  statesmen  and 
theories  of  speculative  inquirers,  that  a  great  nation, 
when  duly  prepared  for  the  task,  is  capable  of  self- 
government  ;  or,  in  other  words,  that  a  purely  repub- 
lican form  of  government  can  be  formed  and  maintained 
in  a  country  of  vast  extent,  peopled  by  millions  of  in- 
habitants."— Ibid.,  pp.  601-606. 

On  the  2d  of  July,  1788,  the  President  of  Con- 
gress informed  that  body  that  he  had  laid  before  Con- 
gress the  ratifications  of  the  Constitution  by  the  con- 
ventions of  nine  States.  On  that  day  a  committee  was 
appointed  to  report  an  act  'for  putting  the  said  Con* 
stitution  into  operation.'  It  was  not,  however,  until  the 
13th  of  September  that  Congress  agreed  on  a  plan. 
The  first  Wednesday  in  January  was  fixed  for  the  ap- 
pointment of  electors  ;  the  first  Wednesday  in  Februa- 
ry for  their  meeting  to  vote  for  a  President ;  and  the 
first  Wednesday  in  March  as  the  time,  and  New  York 
as  the  place,  for  commencing  proceedings  under  the 
Constitution. 

Accordingly  the  representatives  and  senators  elect 
assembled  in  New  York  ;  but  it  was  not  until  a  month 
after  the  time  appointed  that  there  was  a  quorum  to 
transact  any  business. — Ibid.,  p.  603. 


WASHING  TON  AT  MO  UNT  VERNON.  433 


SECTION   TENTH. 

ADMINISTRATION    OF   WASHINGTON. 

On  the  14th  of  April,  1789,  a  messenger  from  the  President  of  the  National 
Congress  arrived  at  Mount  Vernon,  to  announce  to  General  Washington  that 
he  had  been  unanimously  chosen  the  first  President  of  the  United  States. 
While  he  is  preparing  to  resign  once  more  the  quiet  of  a  home  which  had 
more  charms  for  him  than  all  the  blandishments  of  power  or  station,  let  up- 
turn our  eyes  on  the  picture  which  the  Potomac  farmer  draws  of  the  life  he 
had  been  leading  since  he  retired  from  the  tumults  of  war.  •  He  is  writing  to 
Lafayette : — 

Life  at  Mount  Vernon. — ■  Free  from  the  bustle  of  a  camp  and  the  busy 
scenes  of  public  life,  I  am  solacing  myself  with  those  tranquil  enjoyments 
of  which  the  soldier,  who  is  ever  in  pursuit  of  fame ;  the  statesman,  whose 
watchful  days  and  sleepless  nights  are  spent  in  devising  schemes  to  promote 
the  welfare  of  his  own,  perhaps  the  ruin  of  other  countries — as  if  this  globe 
was  insufficient  for  us  all — and  the  courtier,  who  is  always  watching  the  coun- 
tenance of  his  prince,  in  hopes  of  catching  a  gracious  smile,  can  have  very 
little  conception.  I  have  not  only  retired  from  all  public  employments,  but  I 
am  retiring  within  myself,  and  shall  be  able  to  view  the  solitary  walk,  and 
tread  the  paths  of  private  life  with  heartfelt  satisfaction.  Envious  of  none,  1 
am  determined  to  be  pleased  with  all ;  and  this,  my  dear  friend,  being  the 
order  of  my  march,  I  will  move  gently  down  the  stream  of  life  until  I  sleep 
with  my  fathers.' 

In  another  to  the  Marchioness,  inviting  her  to  America  to  see  the  coun- 
try, young,  rude,  and  uncultivated  as  it  is,  for  the  liberties  of  which  her  hus- 
band had  fought,  bled,  and  acquired  much  glory,  and  where  everybody 
admired  and  loved  him,  he  adds  :  '  I  am  now  enjoying  domestic  ease  under 
the  shadow  of  my  own  vine  and  my  own  fig-tree,  in  a  small  villa,  with  the  im- 
plements of  husbandry  and  lambkins  about  me Come,  then,  let 

me  entreat  you,  and  call  my  cottage  your  own;  for  your  doors  do  not  open 
to  you  with  more  readiness  than  mine  would.  You  will  see  the  plain  manner 
in  which  we  live,  and  meet  with  rustic  civility ;  and  you  shall  taste  the  sim- 
plicity of  rural  life.  It  will  diversify  the  scene,  and  may  give  you  a  highet 
relish  for  the  gayeties  of  the  court  when  you  return  to  Versailles.' 

Of  the  Farmer-life  he  was  leading. — '  The  more  I  am  acquainted  with 
agricultural  affairs,'  he  says,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend  in  England,  '  the  better  I 
am  pleased  with  them  ;  insomuch  that  I  can  nowhere  find  so  much  satisfaction 
as  in  these  innocent  and  useful  pursuits.  While  indulging  these  feelings,  I 
am  led  to  reflect  how  much  more  delightful  to  an  undebauched  mind,  is  £he 
task  of  making  imnrovements  on  the  earth,  than  all  the  vainglory  that  can  be 
28 


434  WASHINGTON'S  FARMER-LIFE. 

acquired  from  ravaging  it  by  the  most  uninterrupted  career  of  conquest. 
How  pitiful,  in  the  age  of  reason  and  religion,  is  that  false  ambition  which 
desolates  the  world  with  fire  and  sword  for  the  purpose  of  conquest  and  fame, 
compared  to  the  milder  virtues  of  making  our  neighbors  and  our  fellow- 
men  as  happy  as  their  frail  convictions  and  perishable  natures  will  permit, 
them  to  be.' 

Irving  thus  describes  the  farmer-life  of  Washington  : — '  The  ornamental 
cultivation  of  which  we  have  spoken,  was  confined  to  the  grounds  appertaining 
to  what  was  called  the  mansion-house  farm;  but  his  estate  included  four 
other  farms,  all  lying  contiguous.,  and  containing  three  thousand  two  hundred 
and  sixty  acres  ;  each  farm  having  its  bailiff  or  overseer,  with  a  house  for  his 
accommodation,  barns  and  out-house  for  the  produce,  and  cabins  for  the 
negroes.  On  a  general  map  of  the  estate,  drawn  out  by  Washington  himself, 
these  farms  were  all  laid  down  accurately,  and  their  several  fields  numbered ; 
he  knew  the  soil  and  local  qualities  of  each,  and  regulated  the  culture  uf  them 
accordingly. 

*  In  addition  to  these  fine  farms  there  were  several  hundred  acres  of  fine 
woodland,  so  that  the  estate  presented  a  beautiful  diversity  of  land  and  water. 
In  the  stables,  near  the  mansion-house,  were  the  carriage  and  saddle-horses, 
of  which  he  was  very  choice ;  on  the  four  farms  there  were  54  draught-horses, 
12  mules,  317  head  of  black  cattle,  360  sheep,  and  a  great  number  of  swine, 
which  ran  at  large  in  the  wood. 

1  He  now  read  much  on  husbandry  and  gardening,  and  copied  out  treatises 
on  those  subjects.  He  corresponded  also  with  the  celebrated  Arthur  Young, 
from  whom  he  obtained  seeds  of  all  kinds,  improved  plows,  plans  for  laying 
out  farm-yards,  and  advice  on  various  parts  of  rural  economy.' 

•  Agriculture,'  writes  he  to  him,  '  has  ever  been  among  the  most  favored  of 
my  amusements.  Though  I  have  never  possessed  much  skill  in  the  art,  and 
nine  years'  total  inattention  to  it  has  added  nothing  to  a  knowledge,  which  is 
best  understood  from  practice  ;  but  with  the  means  you  have  been  so  obliging 
as  to  furnish  me,  I  shall  return  to  it,  though  rather  late  in  the  day,  with  more 
alacrity  than  ever.'1 

In  anticipation  that  he  would  be  called  once  more  from  his  retirement  to 
preside  over  the  nation,  Irving  says :  "  Before  the  official  forms  of  an  elec- 
tion could  be  carried  into  operation,  a  unanimous  sentiment  throughout  the 
Union  pronounced  him  the  nation's  choice  to  fill  the  presidential  chair.  He 
looked  forward  to  the  possibility  of  his  election  with  characteristic  modesty 
and  unfeigned  reluctance,  as  his  letters  to  his  confidential  friends  bear  wit- 
ness :  '  It  has  no  fascinating  allurements  for  me,'  he  again  writes  to  Lafayette. 
'  At  my  time  of  life,  and  under  my  circumstances,  the  increasing  infirmities  of 
nature,  and  the  growing  love  of  retirement  do  not  permit  me  to  entertain  a 
wish  beyond  that  of  living  and  dying  an  honest  man  on  my  own  farm.  Let 
those  follow  the  pursuits  of  ambition  and  fame  who  have  a  keener  relish  for 
rhem,  or  who  may  have  more  years  in  store  for  the  enjoyment.'  " 

Irving's  Life  of  Washington^  vol.  iv.  pp.  468,  469. 


WASHINGTON'S  LAST  VISIT  TO  HIS  MOTHER.  435 

Washington' s  Feelings  on  leaving  Home  to  enter  on  the  Presidency. — 
They  are  best  known  from  an  entry  in  his  journal  on  the  evening  of  the  16th 
of  April,  1789.  '  About  ten  o'clock  I  bade  adieu  to  Mount  Vernon,  to  private 
life,  and  to  domestic  felicity  ;  and  with  a  mind  oppressed  with  more  anxious  and 
painful  sensations  than  I  have  words  to  express,  set  out  for  New  York,  in  com- 
pany with  Mr.  Thompson  and  Colonel  Humphreys,  with  the  best  disposion  to 
render  service  to  my  country  in  obedience  to  its  call,  but  with  less  hope  of 
answering  its  expectations.'1 

Washington's  last  Visit  to  his  Mother. — 'Toward  evening  Washington 
left  Mount  Vernon  on  horseback,  and  rode  rapidly  towards  Fredericksburg, 
where  his  aged  and  invalid  mother  resided.  He  went  to  embrace  her,  and 
bid  her  farewell,  before  leaving  for  the  distant  seat  of  government.  She  was 
suffering  from  an  acute  disease,  and  the  weight  of  more  than  fourscore  years 
was  upon  her.  The  interview  between  the  matron  and  her  illustrious  son 
was  full  of  the  most  touching  sublimity.'  '  The  people,  madam,'  said  Wash- 
ington, '  have  been  pleased,  with  the  most  flattering  unanimity,  to  elect  me 
to  the  chief  magistracy  of  the  United  States ;  but  before  I  can  assume  the 
functions  of  that  office,  I  have  come  to  bid  you  an  affectionate  farewell.  So 
soon  as  the  public  business,  which  must  necessarily  be  encountered  in  arrang- 
ing a  new  government,  can  be  disposed  of,  I  shall  hasten  to  Virginia,  and—  ■ 
Here  she  interrupted  him  saying,  '  You  will  see  me  no  more.  My  great  age, 
and  the  disease  that  is  rapidly  approaching  my  vitals,  warn  me  that  I  shall 
not  be  long  in  this  world.  I  trust  in  God  I  am  somewhat  prepared  for  a  bet- 
ter.    But  go,  George !    fulfil  the    high  destinies  which  Heaven  appears   to 

1  *  He  had  won    laurels  in  the  field  ;    would  they  tudes,  in  amount  of  population,  in  manners,  soils,  cli- 

continue  to  flourish  in  the  cabinet  ?     His  position  was  mates,  and  productions,  and  the  characteristics  of  their 

surrounded  by  difficulties.      Inexperienced  in  the  du-  several  peoples. 

ties  of  civil  administration,  he  was  to  inaugurate  a  new  '  Beyond  the  Alleghanies  extended  regions  almost 

and  untried  system  of  government,  composed  of  States  boundless,  as  yet  for  the  most  part  wild  and  unculti- 

and  people,  as  yet  a  mere  experiment,   to  which  some  vated,  the  asylum  of  roving  Indians  and  restless,  dis- 

looked  forward  with  buoyant  confidence, — many  with  contented    white   men.      Vast    tracts,   however,    were 

doubt  and  apprehension.  rapidly  being  peopled,  and  would   soon  be  portioned 

'  He  had,  moreover,  a  high-spirited  people  to  man-  into  sections  requiring  local  governments.  The  great 
age,  in  whom  a  jealous  passion  for  freedom  and  inde-  natural  outlet  for  the  exportation  of  the  products  of 
pendence  had  been  strengthened  by  war,  and  who  might  this  region  of  inexhaustible  fertility,  was  the  Missis- 
bear  with  impatience  even  the  restraints  of  self-imposed  sippi ;  but  Spain  opposed  a  barrier  to  the  free  naviga- 
government.  T.he  Constitution  which  he  was  to  inau-  tion  of  this  river.  Here  was  peculiar  cause  of  solici- 
gurate  had  met  with  vehement  opposition,  when  under  hide.  Before  leaving  Mount  Vernon,  Washington  had 
discussion  in  the  General  and  State  governments,  heard  that  the  hardy  yeomanry  of  the  far  \VTest  were 
Only  three  States — New  Jersey,  Delaware,  and  Geor-  becoming  impatient  of  this  barrier,  and  indignant  at 
gia — had  accepted  it  unanimously.  Several  of  the  most  the  apparent  indifference  of  Congress  to  their  prayers 
important  States  had  adopted  it  by  a  mere  majority  ;  for  its  removal.  He  had  heard,  moreover,  that  British 
five  of  them  under  an  expressed  expectation  of  specified  emissaries  were  fostering  these  discontents,  sowing  the 
amendments  or  modifications  ;  while  two  States — Rhode  seeds  of  disaffection,  and  offering  assistance  to  the 
Island  and  North  Carolina — still  stood  aloof.     .     .     .  Western  people  to  seize  on    the  city  of  New  Orleans, 

'The  very  extent  of  the  country  he  was  called  upon  and   fortify  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi;  while,   on 

to  govern,  ten  times  larger  than   that  of  any  previous  the  other  hand,  the  Spanish  authorities  at  New  Or- 

republic,  must  have  pressed  with  weight  upon  Wash-  leans  were  represented  as  intriguing  to  effect  a  scpara- 

ington's  mind.    It  presented  to  the  Adantic  a  front  of  tion  of  the  Western  territory  from  the  Union,  with   a 

fifteen  hundred  miles,  divided  into  individual  States,  view  or  hope  of  attaching  it  to  the  dominion  of  Spain.' 

differing  in  the  forms  of  their  local  governments,  differ-  — Irving's  Life   of    Washington,   vol.    v.   pp.    x,  a, 

ing  from  each  other  in  interests,  in  territorial  magni-  and  3. 


43^  THE  FIRST  PRESIDENTIAL  IN  A  UGURA  TION 

assign  you ;  go,  my  son,  and  may  that  Heaven's  and  your  mother's  blessing 
be  with  you  always.' 

1  The  mother  and  son  embraced  for  the  last  time ;  for  before  he  could  re- 
turn to  Virginia,  she  was  laid  in  the  grave.1' 

His  Reception  at  Trenton. — '  We  question  whether  any  of  these  testimo- 
nials of  a  nation's  gratitude  affected  Washington  more  sensibly  than  those  he 
received  at  Trenton.  It  was  a  sunny  afternoon  when  he  arrived  on  the 
banks  of  the  Delaware,  where,  twelve  years  before,  he  had  crossed  in  dark- 
ness and  storm,  through  clouds  of  snow  and  drifts  of  floating  ice,  on  his  dar- 
ing attempt  to  strike  a  blow  at  a  triumphant  enemy. 

1  Here  at  present,  all  was  peace  and  sunshine  ;  the  broad  river  flowed  pla- 
cidly along,  and  crowds  awaited  him  on  the  opposite  bank,  to  hail  him  with 
love  and  transport. 

'We  will  not  dwell  on  the  joyous  ceremonials  with  which  he  was  wel- 
comed ;  but  there  was  one  too  peculiar  to  be  omitted.  The  reader  may  re- 
member Washington's  gloomy  night  on  the  banks  of  the  Assunpink,  which 
flows  through  Trenton  \  the  camp  fires  of  Cornwallis  in  front  of  him ;  the 
Delaware  full  of  floating  ice  in  the  rear ;  and  his  sudden  resolve  on  that  mid- 
night retreat  which  turned  the  fortunes  of  his  campaign.  On  the  bridge 
crossing  that  eventful  stream,  the  ladies  of  Trenton  had  caused  a  triumphal 
arch  to  be  erected.  It  was  entwined  with  evergreens  and  laurels,  and  bore 
the  inscription, — The  defender  of  the  mothers  will  be  the  protector  of  the 
daughters. — At  this  bridge  the  matrons  of  the  city  were  assembled  to  pay 
him  reverence  ;  and  as  he  passed  under  the  arch,  a  number  of  young  girls, 
dressed  in  white  and  crowned  with  garlands,  strewed  flowers  before  him,  sing- 
ing an  ode  expressive  of  their  love  and  gratitude.  Never  was  ovation  more 
graceful,  touching,  and  sincere ;  and  Washington,  tenderly  affected,  declared 
that  the  impression  of  it  on  his  heart  could  never  be  effaced.' a 

Washingtofis  Inauguration,  April  $oth,  1 789. — The  day  at  last  came  for 
the  new  government  of  the  United  States  to  be  solemnly  inaugurated,  and  for 
the  old  Confederation  to  die.  The  salute  of  heavy  artillery  proclaiming 
the  birth  of  a  Republic  with  a  written  Constitution,  seemed  to  accord  less 
with  the  solemnity  of  the  occasion,  than  the  call  of  the  church  bells  to  the 
temples  of  prayer;  for  from  all  quarters  the  population  went  streaming  up  to 
their  accustomed  places  of  worship,  to  offer  thanksgiving  and  praise  for  the 
deliverance  of  a  long-suffering  people  from  the  oppressions  of  a  foreign  foe, 
and  the  late  apprehensions  of  civil  anarchy,  as  well  as  to  invoke  the  divine 
benediction  upon  the  beloved  chieftain  who  had  led  them  through  the  wilder- 
ness, and  who  was  now  to  put  them  in  possession  of  the  promised  land. 
Their  victorious  general  was  to  crown  the  arch  of  civil  liberty. 

'  At  twelve  o'clock  the  city  troops  paraded  before  Washington's  door ;  and 
soon  after   the  committee  of  Congress  and  heads  of  departments,  moved 

1  Lossing's  Home  of  Washington,  p.  208.  *  Irving' s  Life  of  Washington,  vol.  iv.  pp.  508,  509. 


THE  SIMPLE  CEREMONIES.  437 

forward,  preceded  by  the  troops  ;  next  came  the  committees  and  heads  of  the 
departments  in  their  carriages ;  then  Washington  in  a  coach  of  state,  his  aide- 
de-camp,  Colonel  Humphreys,  and  his  secretary,  Mr.  Lear,  in  his  own  car- 
riage. The  foreign  ministers  and  a  long  train  of  citizens  brought  up  the  rear. 
About  two  hundred  yards  before  reaching  the  Hall — the  City  Hall  then  stand- 
ing at  the  head  of  Broad  Street — Washington  and  his  suite  alighted  from 
their  carriages,  and  passed  through  the  troops,  who  were  drawn  up  on  each 
side,  into  the  hall  and  senate  chamber,  where  the  Vice-President,  the  Senate, 
and  House  of  Representatives  were  assembled.  The  Vice-President,  John 
Adams,  recently  inaugurated,  advanced  and  conducted  Washington  to  a  chair 
of  state  at  the  upper  end  of  the  room.  A  solemn  silence  prevailed ;  when 
the  Vice-President  rose  and  informed  him  that  all  things  were  prepared  for 
him  to  take  the  oath  of  office  required  by  the  Constitution. 

1  The  oath  was  administered  by  the  Chancellor  of  the  State  of  New  York 
in  a  balcony  in  front  of  the  Senate  Chamber,  and  in  view  of  an  immense  mul- 
titude occupying  the  street,  the  windows,  and  even  the  roofs  of  the  adjacent 
houses.  The  balcony .  formed  a  kind  of  open  recess,  with  lofty  columns 
supporting  the  roof.  In  the  centre  was  a  table  with  a  covering  of  crimson 
velvet,  upon  which  lay  a  sup«erbly  bound  Bible  on  a  crimson  velvet  cushion. 
This  was  all  the  paraphernalia  for  the  august  scene.  All  eyes  were  fixed 
upon  the  balcony,  when,  at  the  appointed  hour,  Washington  made  his  appear- 
ance, accompanied  by  various  public  functionaries  and  members  of  the  Sen- 
ate and  House  of  Representatives.  He  was  clad  in  a  full  suit  of  dark-brown 
cloth,  of  American  manufacture,  with  a  steel-hilted  dress  sword,  white  silk 
stockings,  and  silver  shoe-buckles.  His  hair  was  dressed  and  powdered  in 
the  fashion  of  the  day,  and  worn  in  a  bag  and  solitaire. 

1  His  entrance  on  the  balcony  was  hailed  by  universal  shouts.  He  was 
evidently  moved  by  this  demonstration  of  public  affection.  Advancing  to  the 
front  of  the  balcony,  he  laid  his  hand  upon  his  heart,  bowed  several  times, 
and  then  retreated  to  an  arm-chair  near  the  table.  The  populace  appeared 
to  understand  that  the  scene  had  overcome  him ;  and  were  hushed  at  once 
into  profound  silence.  After  a  few  moments  Washington  rose  and  again  came 
forward.  John  Adams,  the  Vice-President,  stood  at  his  right ;  on  his  left  the 
Chancellor  of  the  State,  Robert  R.  Livingston ; '  somewhat  in  the  rear  were 
Roger  Sherman,  Alexander  Hamilton,  Generals  Knox,  St.  Clair,  the  Baron 
Steuben,2  and  others. 

1  In  his  Speech  at  the  City  Hall,  New  York,  March  city  in  that  body  ;  and  he  threw  the  whole  weight  of 

to,  1831,  while  enumerating  the  revolutionary  worthies  his  talents  and  influence  into  the  doubtful  scale  of  the 

of  that  State,  Daniel  Webster  said  : — '  In  the  Revolu-  Constitution.' 

tionary  history  of  the  country,  the  name  of  Chancellor  2  Major- General  Steuben. — 'Of  the  strictest  in- 

Livingston  became  early  prominent.    He  was  a  mem-  tegrity  and  honor  himself,   he  scorned   meanness  or 

.         ,,>->  ,-,,,,»,  ,  treachery  in  others,  and  hence  never  could  near  Arnold 

ber  of  that  Congress  which    declared  Independence  J  mentioned  without  an  expression  of  indignation.  Once 

and  a  member,  too,  of  the  committee  which  drew  and  in  reviewing  a  regiment,  he  heard  the  name  of  15ene- 

reported  the  immortal  Declaration.  dict  Arnold  called  on  the  muster-roll.     He  immediatel> 

ordered  the  private  bearing  this  detested  cognomen  to 

'At  the  period  of  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution,  advance  out  of  the  line.     He  was  a  fine-looking  fellow 

he  was  its  firm  friend  and  able  advocate.     He  was  a  — every  inch  a  soldier— and  the  Baron,  after  surveying 

u        #.i     o.  ■.    /-  •        t.  •  r   t_      i-  him  a  moment,    said,   "  Change    your  name,   brother 

member  of  the  State  Convention,  being  one  of  that  list  soldier  .  yf)U  are  too  respectabfe  t</bear  the  r  *me  of  a 

of  distinguished  and  gifted  men  who  represented  this     traitor."  "What  name  shall  I  take,  general  ?r  inquired 


438  THE  SOLEMN  WORSHIP  IN  ST.  PAUL'S. 

1  The  Chancellor  advanced  to  administer  the  oath  prescribed  by  the  Con- 
stitution,  and  Mr.  Otis,  the  Secretary  of  the  Senate,  held  up  the  Bible  on  its 
crimson  cushion.1  The  oath  was  read  slowly  and  distinctly  ;  Washington  at 
the  same  time  laying  his  hand  on  the  open  Bible.  When  it  was  concluded, 
he  replied  solemnly,  I  swear — so  help  me,  god  !  Mr.  Otis  would  have  raised 
the  Bible  to  his  lips,  but  he  bowed  down  reverently  and  kissed  it.  The  Chan- 
cellor now  stepped  forward,  waved  his  hand  and  exclaimed,  '  Long  live 
George  Washington,  President  of  the  United  States ! '  At  this  moment  a  flag 
was  displayed  on  the  cupola  of  the  hall ;  on  which  signal  there  was  a  general 
discharge  of  artillery  on  the  Battery.  All  the  bells  in  the  city  rang  out  a  joy- 
ful peal,  and  the  multitude  rent  the  air  with  acclamations.'  "  8 

Returning  to  the  Senate  Chamber,  the  President  delivered  in  person,  to 
both  houses  of  Congress,  his  Inaugural  Address,  after  which  the  whole  as- 
sembly proceeded  on  foot  to  St.  Paul's  Church,  where  they  bowed  in  reverent 
thanksgiving  and  supplication  for  the  blessing  of  the  Almighty  on  the 
new  Republic.  Thus  closed  the  simple  ceremonies  of  the  Inauguration.  The 
day  was  filled  with  rejoicing,  and  the  night  with  festivities,  fire-works,  and 
illuminations. 

It  was  an  affecting  and  inspiring  scene  to  witness  these  heroes  of  the 
Revolution,  who  had,  thirteen  years  before,  entered  through  the  gateway  of 
the  Declaration  of  Independence  into  all  the  perils  and  terrors  of  a  dreadful 
war,  now  lay  aside  their  armor,  and  address  themselves  to  the  great  work  of 
consolidating  free  institutions.  Their  chivalry  in  war  was  equalled  only  by 
the  serene  wisdom  with  which  they  undertook  the  mighty  task  of  launching 
of  a  new  republic  upon  the  sea  of  empire. 

The  New  Government  gets  under  way. — It  is  probable  that  Washington 
never  felt  any  responsibility  press  upon  him  more  heavily  than  when  he  first 
undertook  the  administration  of  the  presidential  office.     In  writing  to  his 

the  young  man.  "  Take  any  other ;  mine  is  at  your  of  Free  and  Accepted  Masons  of  the  State  of  New 
service."  He  accepted  it,  and  immediately  had  his  York,  the  Honorable  Robert  R.  Livingston,  Chancel- 
name  enrolled  Frederick  William  Steuben.     The  Baron  lor  of  the  State."  ' 

settled  upon  him  in  return  a  pension  of  five  dollars  a  4  Fame  stretched  her  wings,  and  with  her  trumpet  blew, 

month,  and  afterwards  gave  him  a  tract  of  land.'  ...  '  Great  Washington  is  near,  what  praise  is  due? 

Steuben  was  a  firm  believer  in  the    Christian   re-  What  title  shall  he  have  ? '  She  paused  and  said, 

ligion,   and  a  constant  attendant    on  divine  worship,  'Not  one — his  name  alone  strikes  every  title  dead." 

when  in  the  city.     He  sleeps  well  beneath   the  soil  of  Masonic  Apron  -wrought  by  Madame  the  Mar- 

the  land  he  helped  to  free ;  and  though  the  nation  re-  chioness  Lafayette. — There  was  a  bond  of  union  of 

fuses  to  erect  a  monument  to  his  worth,  when  we  cease  peculiar  strength  between  Washington  and  Lafayette 

to  remember  his  deeds  we  shall  be  unworthy  of  the  other   than   that  of  mere  personal  friendship.     They 

heritage  he  left  us.' — J.  T.  Headley's  Washington  and  were  members  of  the  fraternity  of  Free  and  Accepted 

his  Generais,  pp.  310  and  313.  Masons,  and  both   loved  the   mystic   brotherhood  sin- 

x  History  of  the  Bible  used  at  the  hiauguration  cerely.  Madame  Lafayette  was  deeply  interested  in 
of  Washington. — That  Bible  belonged  to,  and  is  still  in  everything  that  engaged  the  attention  of  her  husband  ; 
the  possession  of  St.  John's  Lodge  of  Free  and  Accepted  and  she  had  learned  to  reverence  Washington  with  a 
Masons — the  venerable  mother  lodge  of  New  York,  feeling  closely  allied  to  that  of  devotion.  She  had  cor- 
which  numbered  among  its  members  so  many  illus-  responded  with  him,  and  received  from  him  cordial  in- 
trious  and  patriotic  men  of  this  great  State.  Upon  each  vitations  to  the  simple  delights  of  rural  life  at  Mount 
cover  is  a  record,  in  gilt  letters,  concerning  the  Lodge,  Vernon.  She  had,  no  doubt,  earnestly  desired  to  present 
and  on  the  inside,  beautifully  written  upon  parchment,  some  visible  testimonial  of  her  regard  to  the  great  pa- 
in ornamental  style,  by  G.  Thresher,  surmounted  by  a  triot  of  the  New  World  ;  and  when  her  husband  re- 
New  solved  to  visit  him  in  his  retirement  at   Mount  Vernon, 


in  ornamental  style,  by  G.  Thresher,  surmounted 
portrait  of  Washington  engraved  by  Leney,  of 
York,  is  the  following  statement : 


ing  statement :  she  prepared  with  her  own  hands  an  apron  of  white 

"  On  this  Sacred  Volume,  on  the  30th  day  of  April,  satin,   upon    which   she  wrought,    in   needlework,    the 

1789,  in    the  city  of  New  York,  was  administered  to  various  emblems  of   the  Masonic   order.     This  apron 

George  Washington,  the  first  President  of  the  United  Lafayette  brought  with  him,  and  presented  to   his  dis- 

States  of  America,  the  oath  to  support  the  Constitution  tinguished  brother  at  Mount  Vernon. — Ibid.,  pp.  166, 

of  the  Un  ted  States.      This  important  ceremony  was  167. 
performei    by    the    Most  Worshipful    Grand  Master  a  Irving's  Life  of  Washington,  vol.  iv.  pp.  512-514. 


WASHINGTON'S  CONFIDENTIAL  ADVISERS.  439 

friend,  Edward  Rutledge,  he'  says  :  '  I  walk  as  it  were  on  untrodden  ground  : 
so  many  new  and  untoward  circumstances  may  intervene  in  such  a  new  and 
critical  situation,  that  I  shall  feel  an  insuperable  diffidence  in  my  own  abili- 
ties. I  feel  in  the  execution  of  my  arduous  office  how  much  I  shall  stand  in 
need  of  the  countenance  and  aid  of  every  friend  to  myself,  of  every  friend  to 
the  Revolution,  and  of  every  lover  of  good  government.'  Before  the  depart- 
ments were  organized,  he  stood  officially  alone — he  had  no  constitutional  ad- 
visers. '  He  could  turn  with  confidence,  however,'  says  Irving,  '  for  counsel 
in  an  emergency,  to  John  Jay,  who  still  remained  at  the  head  of  affairs  where 
he  had  been  placed  in  1 784.  He  was  sure  of  sympathy  also  in  his  old  com- 
rade, John  Knox,  who  continued  to  officiate  as  secretary  of  war ;  while  the 
affairs  of  the  treasury  were  managed  by  a  board  consisting  of  Samuel  Osgood, 
Walter  Livingston,  and  Arthur  Lee.' 

'Among  the  personal  friends  not  in  office,  to  whom  Washington  felt  that 
he  could  safely  have  recourse  for  aid  in  initiating  the  new  government,  was 
Alexander  Hamilton.  It  is  true,  many  had  their  doubts  of  his  sincere  adhe- 
sion to  it.  In  the  convention  in  Philadelphia,  he  had  held  up  the  British  con- 
stitution as  a  model  to  be  approached  as  nearly  as  possible,  by  blending  some 
of  the  advantages  of  monarchy  with  the  republican  form.  The  form  finally 
adopted  was  too  low-toned  for  him  j  he  feared  it  might  prove  feeble  and  in- 
sufficient ;  but  he  voted  for  it  as  the  best  attainable,  advocated  it  in  the  State 
convention  in  New  York,  and  in  a  series  of  essays,  collectively  known  as  the 
Federalist,  written  conjunctively  with  Madison  and  Jay ;  and  it  was  mainly 
through  his  efforts  as  a  speaker  and  a  writer  that  the  constitution  was  ulti- 
mately accepted.  Still  many  considered  him  at  heart  a  monarchist,  and  sus- 
pected him  of  being  secretly  bent  upon  bringing  the  existing  government  to 
the  monarchical  form.  In  this  they  did  him  injustice.  He  still  continued,  it 
is  true,  to  doubt  whether  the  republican  theory  would  admit  of  a  vigorous  exe- 
cution of  the  laws,  but  was  clear  that  it  ought  to  be  adhered  to  as  long  as 
there  was  any  chance  for  its  success.' 

'  Washington,  who  knew  and  appreciated  Hamilton's  character,  had  im- 
plicit confidence  in  his  sincerity,  and  felt  assured  that  he  would  loyally  aid  in 
carrying  into  effect  the  Constitution  as  adopted. 

"  It  was  a  great  satisfaction  to  Washington,  on  looking  round  for  reliable 
advisers  at  this  moment,  to  see  James  Madison  among  the  members  of  Con- 
gress :  Madison,  who  had  been  with  him  in  the  convention,  who  had  labored 
in  the  Federalist,  and  whose  talents  as  a  speaker,  and  calm,  dispassionate 
reasoner;  whose  extensive  information  and  legislative  experience  destined 
him  to  be  a  leader  in  the  House.  Highly  appreciating  his  intellectual  and 
moral  worth,  Washington  would  often  turn  to  him  for  counsel,  '  I  am  trouble- 
some,' he  would  say,  '  but  you  must  excuse  me  ;  ascribe  it  to  friendship  and 
confidence.' " 

'  Knox,  of  whose  sure  sympathies  we  have  spoken,  was  in  strong  contrast 
with  the  cool  statesman  just  mentioned.  His  mind  was  ardent  and  active, 
his  imagination  vivid,  as  was  his  language.     He  had  abandoned  the  military 


44©       HAMILTON  ESTABLISHES  OUR  FINANCIAL  SYSTEM. 

garb,  but  still  maintained  his  soldier-like  air.  He  was  large  in  person,  above 
the  middle  stature,  with  a  full  face,  radiant  and  benignant,  bespeaking  his 
open,  buoyant,  generous  nature.  He  had  a  sonorous  voice,  and  sometimes 
talked  rather  grandly,  flourishing  his  cane  to  give  effect  to  his  periods.  He 
was  cordially  appreciated  by  Washington,  who  had  experienced  his  prompt 
and  efficient  talent  in  time  of  war,  had  considered  him  one  of  the  ablest  offi- 
cers of  the  Revolution,  and  now  looked  to  him  as  an  energetic  man  of  busi- 
ness, capable  of  giving  practical  advice  in  time  of  peace,  and  cherished  for 
him  that  strong  feeling  of  ancient  companionship  in  toil  and  danger,  which 
bound  the  veterans  of  the  Revolution  firmly  to  each  other.'  ' 

First  Steps  to  be  taken. — There  was  everything  to  be  done.  The  most 
urgent  subject  which  pressed  upon  the  attention  of  Congress,  was  a  revenue  ; 
for  the  country  had  no  means,  either  for  carrying  on  the  government,  or  dis- 
charging the  public  debt.  One  of  its  first  acts  was  to  create  a  tariff  of 
duties  on  the  importation  of  foreign  goods,  and  on  the  tonnage  of  vessels — 
direct  taxation  being  considered  unwise  in  policy,  and  odious  in  practice. 
Another  measure  of  pressing  necessity,  was  the  organization  of  Public  Depart- 
ments to  aid  the  President  in  carrying  on  the  business  of  the  government. 
By  the  Constitution,  the  number  of  executive  departments  of  the  government 
was  not  limited.  It  was  consequently  necessary,  on  the  recommendation  of 
the  President,  that  Congress  should  make  provision  for  the  details  of  the 
administration  ;  and  departments  were  organized  for  State,  Treasury,  and 
War.  For  his  first  secretaries,  Washington  chose  Thomas  Jefferson  for  the 
Department  of  State,  Alexander  Hamilton  for  the  Department  of  the  Treasury, 
and  John  Knox  for  the  Department  of  War.  The  last-named  secretary  had 
also  control  of  the  navy. 

Alexander  Hamilton  establishes  the  Financial  Policy  of  the  Republic. — 
With  some  slight  modifications,  that  policy  has  prevailed  till  the  present 
day.2  This  man,  so  munificently  gifted,  was  justly  regarded  in  his  times, 
as  he  has  been  ever  since,  as  endowed  with  pre-eminent  ability  in  financial 
affairs.  His  reports  from  the  Treasury  Department  were  luminous  and  con- 
vincing, and  his  Essays  on  Public  Credit  are  among  the  best  that  have  ever 

1  Irving's  Life  of  Washington,  vol.  v.  pp.  5,  6,  7.       under  it  established  and  organized.     The  discerning 

a  Probably  no  other  man  ever  lived  of  whose  finan-  eye  of  Washington  immediately  called  him  to  that  post, 

cial   ability   Daniel  Webster  would   have   used   such  which  was  far  the  most  important  in  the  administration 

words  as  the  following  : —  of  the  new  system.     He  was  made   Secretary  of  the 

Mr.  Hamilton  was  elected  one  of  the  distinguished  Treasury  :  and  how  he  fulfilled  the  duties  of  such  a 

delegation  from  the  city   to  the  State  Convention  at  place  at  such  a  time  the  whole  country  perceived  with 

Poughkeepsie,  called  to  ratify  the  new  Constitution.  Its  delight,  and  the  whole  world  saw  with  admiration.    He 

debates  are  published.     Mr.  Hamilton  appears  to  have  smote  the  rock  of  the  national  resources,  and  abundant 

exerted  on  this  occasion,  to  the  utmost,  every  power  streams  of  revenue  gushed  forth.   He  touched  the  dead 

and  faculty  of  his  mind.  corpse  of  Public  Credit,  and  it  sprang  upon  its  feet. 

The  whole  question  was  likely  to  depend  on  the  de-  The  fabled  birth  of  Minerva  from  the  brain  of  Jove, 

cision  of  New  York.     He  felt  the  full  importance  of  the  was  hardly  more  sudden  or  more  perfect   than  the 

crisis,  and  the  reports  of  his  speeches,  imperfect  as  they  financial  system  of  the  United  States,  as  it  burst  forth 

probably  are,  are  yet  lasting  monuments  to  his  genius  from  the    conceptions  of    Alexander    Hamilton. -*• 

and  patriotism.     He  saw  at  last  his  hopes  fulfilled  ; 'he  Webster3 m    Sj>ee<h  at  the   City  Hall,    New   York, 

saw   the  Constitution  adopted,   and   the  government  March  10th,  1831. 


THE  JUDICIARY  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES.  44  * 

been  written.  He  proposed  the  plan  of  funding  the  public  debt,  in  which  he 
embraced  not  only  the  fifty  millions  contracted  by  Congress,  but  the  twenty- 
five  millions  owed  by  the  States  j  providing  for  the  payment  of  the  interest,  and 
the  extinction  of  the  principal,  from  a  revenue  of  customs  duties  levied  chiefly 
on  articles  of  luxury  imported  from  abroad,  and  distilled  spirits  made  at 
home.  The  warmest  personal  and  sectional  feelings  were  aroused  by  this 
plan,  and  the  debates  which  attended  it  reached  dangerous  intensity.  The 
lines  of  political  parties  were  sure  soon  to  be  definitively  drawn  after  so  un- 
relenting a  war  of  ideas.  The  time  was  near  when  every  man  would  range 
himself  under  one  or  the  other  of  the  two  contending  parties — the  Federalists, 
headed  by  Hamilton  as  their  chief  champion,  and  the  Republicans,  whose 
recognized  leader  was  Thomas  Jefferson.  The  financial  policy  of  Hamilton 
prevailed,  and  from  that  time  it  commanded  the  unlimited  confidence  of  a  large 
portion  of  the  American  people.  It  succeeded  in  giving  us,  at  all  times,  an 
adequate  revenue  ;  in  maintaining  the  credit  of  our  government  unimpaired  ; 
and  it  ended  in  the  entire  extinction  of  the  national  debt,  which  exceeded 
seventy-five  million  dollars. 

Establishment  of  the  Judiciary  of  the  United  States. — It  was  one  of  the 
most  important  events  connected  with  the  organization  of  the  government 
and  the  administration  of  justice.  The  great  Judiciary  Act  of  the  24th  of 
September,  1789,  occupies,  in  fact,  a  position  to  the  fundamental  elements  of 
our  government,  second  only  to  the  constitution  itself.  It  organized  the 
whole  system  of  our  national  judiciary,  which  has  reflected  so  much  lustre 
upon  the  nation  ;  and  it  remains  to  this  day  substantially  as  it  was  first  passed. 
Oliver  Ellsworth,1  of  Connecticut,  was  the  author  of  the  Bill,  and  became 
the  second  Chief-Justice  on  the  4th  of  March,  1796,  succeeding  John  Jay,8 
who  resigned  the  office  to  accept  the  mission  to  England. 

The  First  Natiofial  Bank. — Other  most  important  measures  were  passed 
by  the  First  Congress  which  followed  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution.     A 

1  Ellsworth,  Oliver,  an  American  statesman  and  clined  on  account  of  his  health. — Appletons'   Ameri- 

jurist,  born   in   Windsor,  Conn.,  April    29,   1745,  died  can  CycloJ>cedia. 

Nov.  26.  1807.  He  graduated  at  the  College  of  New  '2  '  In  point  of  revolutionary  services,'  says  Hil- 
Jersey  in  1766,  and  soon  after  commenced  the  practice  dreth,  ;only  the  President  himself  stood  upon  higher 
of  law.  In  1777  he  was  chosen  a  delegate  to  the  con-  ground  ;  nor  could  any  person  except  the  Vice-Presi- 
tinental  congress,  and  he  was  a  member  of  the  council  dent,  Adams,  pretend  to  a  place  upon  the  same  level, 
of  Connecticut  from  1780  to  1784,  when  he  was  appoint-  In  lofty  disinterestedness,  in  unyielding  integrity,  in 
ed  a  judge  of  the  Superior  Court.  In  1787  he  was  superiority  to  the  illusions  of  passions,  no  one  of  the 
elected  to  the  convention  which  framed  the  federal  con-  great  men  of  the  revolution  approached  so  near  to 
stitution,  and  was  afterward  a  member  of  the  State  Washington.  Profound  knowledge  of  the  law,  inflex- 
convention  which  ratified  that  instrument.  He  was  a  ible  sense  of  justice,  and  solidity  of  judgment,  had 
Senator  of  the  United  States  from  1789  to  1796,  when  especially  marked  him  out  for  the  office  which  he  held, 
he  was  nominated  by  Washington  Chief-Justice  of  the  Having  played  a  very  active  part  in  a  State,  the  seat 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  over  which  he  of  hostilities  during  the  whole  struggle  of  the  revolu- 
presided  with  great  distinction,  his  opinions  being  tion,  he  knew  what  war  was,  and  dreaded  it  according- 
marked  by  sound  legal  and  ethical  principles,  in  clear  ly.  One  of  the  ministers  who  negotiated  the  treaty  of 
felicitous  language.  In  1799  he  was  appointed  by  peace,  and  afterward  secretary  of  foreign  affairs,  he 
President  Adams  envoy  extraordinary  to  Paris,  and  was  perfectly  familiar  with  all  the  grounds  of  contro- 
with  his  associates,  Davie  and  Murray,  he  successfully  versy  between  the  two  nations.  Though  on  questions 
negociated  a  treaty  with  the  French.  This  accomplish-  of  principle  perfectly  unyielding,  in  matters  of  interest 
ed,  and  his  health  beginning  to  fail,  he  visited  Eng-  and  expediency  he  knew  the  wisdom  of  giving  up  a 
land  for  the  benefit  of  its  mineral  waters;  but  his  in-  part  rather  than  to  risk,  the  loss  of  the  whole.  The  only 
firmities  increasing,  he  resigned  his  office  of  Chief-Jus-  serious  objection  to  his  appointment  was  his  judicial 
tice  in  1800.  Returning  to  Connecticut,  he  was  again  station  ;  but  even  that  gave  an  additional  dignity  tc 
elected  a  member  of  the  council  ;  and  in  1807  he  was  the  mission,  and  in  a  crisis  so  important  the  objection 
appointed  Chief-Justice  of  the  State,  which  office  hede-  lost  much  of  its  weight.' — Appletons'   American  Cy 

clofxediti. 


442 


VERMONT  ADMITTED  TO  THE  UNION. 


National  Bank  was  organized,  after  the  most  violent  and  determined  opposi- 
tion from  the  Republican  party ;  and  it  will  not  be  denied  that  within  the 
limits  of  its  first  charter,  it  highly  subserved  the  purposes  of  the  government, 
regulated  the  currency,  and  answered  the  wants  of  the  people.  It  met  with 
the  deliberate  approbation  of  Washington,  and  went  into  operation  in  Phila- 
delphia, with  a  capital  of  ten  million  dollars.  Kentucky  was  separated  from 
Virginia,  and  erected  into  an  independent  government.  ■  Vermont  was  admit- 
ted as  a  new  State  into  the  Union  ;*  and  the  first  census  of  the  United  States 
was  taken.  It  gave  us  a  population  of  very  nearly  four  millions  with  about 
seven  hundred  thousand  slaves.  Thus  the  Republic  came  into  being  with  the 
Atlean  weight  of  African  slavery,  and  it  carried  the  embarrassing  and  disgrace- 
ful burden,  till  it  was  thrown  off  in  the  convulsions  of  a  Civil  War.     The 


1  Vermont. — The  name  of  this  State,  borrowed  from 
its  evergreen  mountains,  stirs  the  imagination  of  every 
reader  who  is  familiar  with  its  history,  and  recalls  im- 
ages of  grandeur  and  beauty  to  every  traveller  who  has 
passed  through  those  enchanting  regions.  From  the 
crowned  summit  of  Hay  Stack  mountain,  which  stands 
out  bold  and  clear  on  the  skies  of  South-western  Ver- 
mont, the  eye  sweeps  over  an  extended  range  of  country 
which  may  be  fairly  termed  the  most  picturesque  his- 
toric ground  of  North  America.  On_the  east,  beyond 
the  intervening  hills,  the  Green  Mountains  lift  their 
never-fading  ramparts.  Far  away  in  the  blue  distance, 
rise  the  snow-tops  of  the  Adirondacks,  sheltering  the 
deep  forest  valleys  which  stretch  out  from  their  base  :  to 
the  west  beyond,  the  crystal  waters  of  Champlain  and 
Lake  George — where  the  chivalry  of  France  so  long 
held  the  Jleur-de-lis  against  the  veterans  of  Marl- 
borough— stand  the  encircling  mountains,  those  un- 
wasting  fountains  of  the  Hudson  ; — while  to  the  south 
lie  the  battlefields  of  Bennington  and  Saratoga,  where 
England  was  forced  to  let  go  her  grasp  of  that  beauti- 
ful domain  which  had  cost  her  so  much  blood  and 
treasure  to  win  from  her  French  rival. 

0 

Besides  the  innumerable  conflicts  between  Indian 
tribes,  which  had  raged  long  before  the  historic  period, 
these  classic  scenes  have  witnessed  three  wars.  The 
first  saw  the  French  and  American  colonists  through 
the  changing  panorama  of  a  seven  years'  conflict.  The 
second  saw  a  stranger  sight,  where  those  same  American 
and  French  soldiers  met  again,  but  as  allies,  to  fight 
the  same  common  foe  ;  and  still  again  in  the  war  of 
1812,  which  raged  along  our  borders,  when  the  sons  of 
an  independent  and  now  powerful  republic,  were  once 
more  in  arms  against  their  ancient  enemy. 

A  striking  anecdote,  which  is  not  generally  known, 
illustrates  that  spirit  of  love  of  liberty  which  has  always 
had  a  home  in  that  romantic  region.  When  Burgoyne 
came  up  from  Canada  sweeping  all  before  him — 1777 — 
Colonel  Herrick  organized  in  the  township  of  Pawlet. 
in  Western  Vermont,  his  famous  regiment  of  rangers, 
who.  were  the  prototypes  of  the  whole  family  of  rangers 
that  figured  so  largely  in  our  early  national  history. 
They  were  the  terror  of  all  the  country  round— Tory, 
British,  and  Hessians.  In  one  of  his  despatches,  Bur- 
goyne complained  that  '  they  hung  like  a  gathering 
cloud  on  his  flank  ' 


Vermont  was  then  governed  by  a  Council  of  Safety, 
with  headquarters  at  Bennington.  The  following  paper, 
which  was  extracted  with  supreme  care  by  Mr.  Heil 
Hollister,  from  the  records  of  Bennington,  shows 
the  sentiment  of  the  founders  of  that  State,  which 
was  the  only  one  that  had  then  been  established  in 
America  south  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  whose  soil  was 
never  trod  by  a  slave.  Though  somewhat  crude  and 
inelegant  for  a  State  Paper,  it  might  have  served  in 
spirit,  and  almost  in  form,  as  a  miniature  model  for 
Abraham  Lincoln's  Proclamation  of  eighty-six  years 
later  : 

'Headquarters,  Pawlet.  28  Nov.,  1777. 
*  To  whom  it  may  concern  : — Know  ye  that  whereas 
Dinah  Mattis  a  negro  woman  with  Nancy  her  Child  of 
two  months  old  was  taken  Prissnor  on  Lake  Cham- 
plain  with  the  British  troops  Somewhere  near  Col. 
Gilliner's  Patten  the  twelfth  day  of  Instant  November 
by  a  scout  under  my  command,  and  according  to -a 
Resolve  passed  by  the  Honorable  Continental  Con- 
gress that  all  Prisses  belorng  to  the  Captivators  there- 
fore I  being  conscientious  that  it  is  not  right  in  the 
sight  of  God  to  keep  Slaves  I  therefore  obtaining  leave  of 
the  Detachment  under  my  Command  to  give  her  &  her 
child  their  freedom  I  do  therefore  give  the  said  Dinah 
Mattis  &  Nancy  her  child  there  freedom  to  pass  &  re- 
pass any  where  through  the  United  States  of  America 
with  her  behaving  as  bocometh  &  to  Trade  &  Traffic 
for  her  Self  &  Child  as  though  she  was  born  free,  with- 
out being  Molested  by  any  Person  or  Persons.  In 
witness  whereunto  I  have  'hereunto  set  my  hand  or 
subscribed  my  name  (signed)  Ebenezer  Allen  Capt.* 

After  the  war  was  over,  seventy  revolutionary  soldiers 
settled  in  Pawlet.  Their  longevity  shows  them  to  have 
been  men  of  the  highest  physical  and  moral  stamina. 
They,  as  a  class,  were  distinguished  for  industry, 
thrift  and  enterprise,  and  though  the  fires  of  the  revolu- 
tion consumed  their  substance.  '  and  tried  their  souls,» 
nearly  all  of  them  succeeded  in  establishing  a  home, 
and  acquiring  a  competence.  One  (George  Rush),  lived 
to  the  age  of  no  ;  another  (Nathan  M.  Lounsbury), 
too  ;  and  the  aggregate  of  the  lives  of  the  54  ascertained, 
was  4,247  years,  or  an  average  of  78  years  and  8  months. 
These  interesting  facts  I  have  gathered  from  Mr.  Heij 
Hollister's  History  0/ the  Town  of  Pawlet. 


OUR  FOREIGN  RELA  TIONS—  WASHINGTON'S  SECOND  TE  KM.    443 

revenue  amounted  to  five  millions,  while  the  imports  and  exports  were  nearly 
balanced  at  twenty  millions  per  annum.  The  ratio  of  representation  in  Con- 
gress was  fixed  at  one  representative  for  every  thirty-three  thousand  in- 
habitants. 

Our  Foreign  Relations. — The  government  was  now  in  full  working  order, 
and  a  long  period  of  peace  and  prosperity  seemed  to  be  spread  out  before  it. 
The  influence  of  Washington  was  so  great  and  so  benign,  and  he  had  been 
placed  at  the  head  of  public  affairs  with  such  unanimity,  that  it  was  found  to 
be  no  difficult  task  to  institute  advantageous  and  friendly  relations  with  foreign 
States.  The  name  of  the  political  Father  of  the  American  Republic  had 
already  become  known  and  venerated  throughout  the  world.  He  was  re- 
garded as  the  noblest  illustration  of  patriotism  and  incorruptible  virtue  among 
the  living, — perhaps  even  among  the  dead.  The  moral  influence  which  began 
to  be  put  forth  by  the  Republic  was  by  no  means  limited  to  its  absolute 
power,  and  in  no  respect  could  it  be  measured  by  the  years  of  its  existence. 
The  earth  was  dotted  with  nations  hoary  with  antiquity,  few  of  whom  com- 
manded such  entire  confidence,  and  none  of  whom  elicited  so  much  praise. 
Ministers  Plenipotentiary  were  appointed  by  Washington  to  represent  us  near 
the  chief  governments  of  the  world,  and  they  were  received  with  every  mark 
of  respect.  Courtesy  was  extended  to  our  travellers  ;  protection  was  given 
to  our  citizens.  Our  commerce,  which  had  lived  even  in  defiance  of  the 
all-sweeping  and  all-desolating  leets  of  the  British  navy,  now  sprang  into  a 
sudden  expansion. 

Washington  elected  for  a  Second  Ter?n. — A  history  of  Washington's  ad- 
ministration would  stretch  far  beyond  the  limits  assigned  to  this  work.  I 
have  been  able  to  spare  space  enough  only  to  enumerate  the  most  important 
events  which  occuired  during  his  first  administration.  Before  it  had  expired, 
the  Constitution  demanded  that  another  Presidential  election  should  take 
place.  The  country  again  turned  its  eyes  to  Washington,  for  the  confidence 
reposed  in  him  had  grown,  if  possible,  still  stronger  every  year ;  and  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  men,  who  either  entertained  different  views  in  regard  to 
government,  or  who  were  prompted  by  a  selfish  ambition,  there  was  the 
same  feeling  of  unanimity  that  had  been  displayed  when  he  was  first*  placed 
in  the  presidential  chair.  He  was  accordingly  re-elected,  and  his  second 
inauguration  took  place  in  March,  1793.  The  great  abilities  of  Thomas 
Jefferson  were  not  called  in  question ;  but  John  Adams  was  elected  Vice- 
President  over  his  rival.  This  is  less  to  be  attributed  to  a  lack  of  appre- 
ciation of  Jefferson's  character  and  public  services,  than  to  the  fact  that 
Jefferson  was  now  known  to  hold  different  views  in  regard  to  the  scope  and 
the  policy  of  the  government,  from  those  of  Washington.  A  more  sincere 
republican  than  Washington  did  not  exist  in  the  whole  country.;  but  Jeffer- 
son held  opinions  more  radically  democratic.  His  views  on  most  great 
public  questions,  more  closely  resembled  those  of  the  statesmen  of  the  pres- 


444  APPREHENDED  TROUBLES  WITH  FRANCE. 

ent  day.  It  is  asserted  with  much  plausibility,  that  Jefferson  felt  keenly 
jealous  also  of  the  great  influence  which  Alexander  Hamilton  had  over 
Washington's  mind.  Nothing  would  be  further  from  the  truth  than  to  repre- 
sent any  individual  as  holding  a  controlling  influence  over  Washington's  mind 
or  opinions ;  but,  probably,  among  all  the  great  men  that  were  clustered 
around  him,  he  felt  more  confidence  in  the  political  judgment,  the  financial 
ability,  and  the  classic  completeness  of  Hamilton's  mind — he  doubtless  re- 
garded him,  « take  him  all  for  all,'  as  the  ablest  man  for  this  station.  Wash- 
ington had  a  keen  perception  of  character,  and  he  was  very  rarely  mistaken 
in  his  judgment.  He  fully  appreciated  the  abilities  and  the  services  of  Jeffer- 
son, and  he  chose,  during  his  first  term,  to  have  him  act  as  his  Secre- 
tary of  State.  He  had  no  favorites — we  cannot  say  he  had  no  partialities — but 
in  his  public  life,  we  can  certainly  trace  none  which  grew  out  of  selfish  or 
private  feelings.  But  Washington's  mind  was  more  conservative  than  Jeffer- 
son's. Washington  surpassed  almost  all  men  in  that  rarest  quality — a  genius 
for  crystallizing  all  the  chaotic  elements  of  power  into  the  enduring  structure 
of  a  well-organized  civil  administration.  Washington  had  a  native  economy 
of  mind,  which  in  war  or  in  cabinet  councils,  made  the  most  out  of  every- 
thing. There  was  no  variableness  in  his  character — no  incompleteness  in  his 
estimates — his  perception  reached  to  every  detail,  and  he  perfectly  compre- 
hended all  aggregates.  Jefferson  was  as  bold  and  daring  in  statesmanship,  as 
Decatur  was  in  a  sea-fight ;  but  he  sometimes  made  mistakes — Washington 
never.  No  man  but  Jefferson  could  have  written  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence so  well ;  but  the  massive  and  colossal  mind  of  John  Adams  was  more 
compact  and  commanding.  John  Adams  was  a  primitive  man.  We  think  we 
here  discern  the  reasons  why  the  country  preferred  to  have  John  Adams  lead 
the  way  as  Washington's  successor ;  nor  is  it  probable  that  any  enlightened 
American  statesman  or  citizen  now  regrets,  that  in  the  early  period  of  our 
Republic,  the  policy  of  the  nation  was  decided  so  entirely  by  Washington, 
Adams,  and  Hamilton.  They  were  the  men  to  found  a  Republic — Jefferson 
and  Jackson  were  the  men  to  expand  it  into  ampler  proportions. 

Development  of  the  two  great  Political  Parties. — Washington  had  not 
got  on  far  in  his  second  term,  before  party  spirit  began  to  run  very  high ;  and 
Jefferson  unmasked  his  hostility  to  the  entire  Federal  policy.  He  opposed 
it  with  the  utmost  vehemence  of  his  nature,  and  with  all  the  caustic  severity 
of  his  pen.  But  in  logical  argument  he  was  no  match  for  Hamilton.  Wherever 
he  came  in  collision  with  him,  he  found  his  master.  Jefferson  was  great  in 
many  directions — Hamilton  in  all. 

Apprehended  Troubles  with  France. — In  the  mean  time  the  French  Revo- 
lution had  occurred.  The  head  of  Louis  XVI.  had  rolled  from  the  guillotine. 
The  triumph  of  Democracy  had  been  proclaimed  in  Paris,  bringing  with  it  a 
reign  of  blood.  France  had  also  declared  war  against  Great  Britain  and 
Holland ;    and  the   men  who  controlled   the  French   Councils  at   the  time 


BITTER  PARTY  CONFLICTS.  445 

made  a  serious  attempt  to  embroil  our  government  in  the  quarrels  of  their 
country.  M.  Genet  was  appointed  minister  of  France  to  the  United  States. 
The  chief  object  of  his  mission  was  to  induce  America  to  take  sides  with 
France ;  and  the  whole  scheme  was  laid  before  the  Secretary  of  State.  But 
Washington  gave  it  no  encouragement,  for  he  was  determined  that'  we  should 
be  involved  in  no  European  contests.  Each  member  of  the  cabinet  was  con- 
sulted on  the  matter,  and  they  unanimously  recommended  the  President  to 
issue  a  Proclamation  of  Neutrality.  It  was  immediately  done.  The  maxim 
then  adopted  for  our  government,  was  'Friendship  with  all — entangling 
alliances  with  none.'  We  owe  much  of  our  prosperity  as  a  nation  to  the 
adoption  of  this  policy. '  It  has  prevailed  till  the  present  time,  and  fatal  will 
be  the  day  when  it  is  abandoned.  But  M.  Genet  had  already  reached 
Charleston  on  his  way  to  the  Capitol,  and  he  was  received  with  open  arms 
everywhere  by  the  Republican  party.  This  excited  high  hopes  for  the 
success  of  his  scheme,  and  he  had  the  audacity  to  attempt  to  persuade  the 
American  people  to  embark  actively  in  the  great  war  then  raging  in  Europe. 
He  even  arranged  for  fitting  out  privateers,  in  the  port  of  Charleston,  against 
British  commerce,  and  in  all  his  acts  reduced  himself  from  the  high  position 
of  an  ambassador,  to  that  of  an  incendiary  and  a  spy.  At  last  Washington 
requested  the  French  government  to  recall  him,  and  appoint  a  more  discreet 
man  in  his  place.  It  was  done.  Congress  applauded  Washington's  course, 
and  it  was  approved  by  the  nation.  But  a  new  spirit  of  animosity  between 
the  Republicans  and  Federalists  was  stirred  up  ;  and  debates,  correspondence, 
and  newspapers  were  conducted  with  more  asperity  and  venom  at  that  period, 
than  has  ever  since  been  witnessed. 

Bitter  Party  Conflicts. — The  Republicans  accused  the  Federalists  of  mo- 
narchical tendencies — of  a  desire  to  form  an  alliance  with  England,  our  old 
enemy — of  hostility  to  the  progress  of  liberal  principles  and  free  government 
in  Europe ;  and  by  some  of  Jefferson's  organs  the  grossest  attacks  were  made 
upon  Washington  himself.  Even  his  personal  character  did  not  escape  the 
worst  insinuations,  while  his  motives  were  assailed,  and  the  most  offensive, 
unjust,  and  malignant  satires  were  launched  against  his  policy.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Federalists,  who  were  none  the  less  bitter,  charged  the  Republicans 
as  being  the  abettors  of  Robespierre,  and  the  ferocious   leaders  who   were 

1  January  9,  1852. — Louis  Kossuth,  the  Hungarian  ing  its  action  to  its  own  duties.  Our  example  was  one 
chief,  called,  with  Gen.  Lewis  Cass,  upon  Henry  Clay,  of  Christian  progress  ;  and  the  United  States,  as  the 
while  the  latter  lay  sick  in  his  room  at  Washington  city,  only  living  Republic,  and  example  of  man's  capability 
Mr.  Clay  listened  patiently  to  his  comments  on  the  con-  for  self-government,  was  bound  to  encourage  progress 
dition  of  Hungary  and  the  situation  of  France,  which  and  prosperity  on  this  continent.  All  this  would  be 
Kossuth  believed  would  provoke  civil  war,  and  perhaps  endangered  and  destroyed  by  foreign  wars,  and  with 
a  general  revolution  ;  and  to  avoid  which,  or  control  them  all  hopes  of  free  institutions.  Warming  with  the 
it  for  the  greatest  good,  he  hoped  for  the  intervention  importance  oi  his  subject,  as  he  proceeded,  he  stood 
of  the  United  States  in  the  affairs  of  Europe.  Mr.  erect,  and  with  much  emotion  and  touching  emphasis, 
Clay  replied  that  no  greater  calamity  could  befall  this  said  :  '  As  a  dying  man,  I  oppose  your  doctrine  of  in 
government  than  this  doctrine  of  intervention.  The  tervention.'  Grasping  his  hand,  as  he  bade  him  fare- 
vital  principle  of  this  country,  he  said,  rested  upon  its  well,  he  said,  '  God  bless  you  and  your  family  !  God 
republican  character,  as  seen  in  the  capacity  of  its  peo-  bless  your  country  !  May  she  yet  be  free  ! '  — Col- 
ple  for  self-government,  and  in  its  practice  of  confin-  lins'  Hist,  of  Kentucky,  vol.  i.  pp.  63,  64. 


44<>  A  SECOND  WAR  WITH  ENGLAND  THREATENED. 

drenching  France  in  blood  during  her  Reign  of  Terror — of  entertaining  and 
promulgating  the  most  licentious  views  and  principles  of  government,  and 
even  of  a  desire  to  upheave  the  foundations  of  the  State,  and  shatter  the 
whole  structure  of  society. 

None  of  these  accusations  were  just  on  either  side ;  and  now  that  we  an 
removed  far  enough  from  the  disturbing  influences  of  those  times,  we  con- 
template with  regret  the  degradation  to  which  great  men  and  patriotic  states- 
men can  descend,  when  their  passions  are  lashed  into  fury  by  the  excitements 
of  the  hour. 

Insurgent  Movements  against  Federal  Authority  suppressed. — From 
another  quarter  the  stability  of  the  government  was  seriously  menaced. 
Americans  abhorred  taxation,  and  were  not  always  willing  to  submit  to  it, 
even  when  levied  by  their  own  representatives  to  raise  means  to  carry  on 
their  own  government.  In  the  district  of  Pittsburg,  some  seven  thousand 
insurgents  had  collected  to  resist  the  law.  The  United  States  Marshal  was 
seized,  and  other  public  officers  maltreated.  Washington  dealt  with  these 
insurgents  in  a  summary  manner.  He  made  requisitions  upon  Virginia,  Mary- 
land, New  Jersey,  and  even  Pennsylvania  herself,  for  fifteen  thousand  militia. 
They  were  put  under  the  command  of  Governor  Lee,  who  marched  to  the  re- 
volted district,  dispersed  the  insurgents,  and  asserted  the  supremacy  of  the  law. 

A  Second  War  with  England  threatened.  — Having  overcome  all  these 
difficulties,  Washington  had  still  a  more  serious  work  before  him.  He  found 
himself  on  the  verge  of  a  second  war  with  England.  It  would  have  been 
strange  indeed  if,  after  the  painful  experiences  of  the  late  Revolution,  the 
Americans  could  at  once  forget  how  many  sacrifices  the  war  of  Independence 
had  cost  them,  or  bury  in  oblivion  the  barbarities  which  had  characterized 
the  course  of  their  enemies  during  the  struggle.  Nor  is  it  rational  to  sup- 
pose that  a  haughty  empire  could  at  once  recover  from  the  deep  humiliation 
it  had  suffered  in  its  defeat.  Wise  and  good  men,  however,  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic,  had  done  their  best  to  soften  these  asperities,  and  inspire  better 
feelings.  But  they  found, — what  has  been  found,  and  will  in  every  age, — 
that  one  bad  man  can  do  more  mischief  in  a  moment  than  a  hundred  good 
men  can  ever  repair — that  one  unscrupulous  writer  can  stir  up  more  passions 
in  an  hour,  than  can  be  allayed  in  a  generation.  The  newspapers  in  both 
countries,  teemed  with  irritating  articles  and  correspondence.  The  Americans 
were  accused  of  defrauding  the  loyalists  of  the  Revolution  out  of  their  prop- 
erty and  estates,  and  preventing  British  subjects  from  recovering  debts  con- 
tracted before  the  Revolution.  There  was  a  show  of  justice  in  these  accusations  ; 
but  our  public  integrity  was  not  seriously  called  in  question  ;  and  in  almost 
every  instance  the  loyalists  brought  in  extravagant  claims,  and  prosecuted 
them  in  an  offensive  spirit.  But  the  Americans  also  had  just  and  well- 
founded  causes  of  complaint,  not  so  much  on  individual,  as  on  public  account. 
One  source  of  deep  irritation  consisted  in  the  refusal  of  Great  Britain  to  sur- 


ENGLISH  ARROGANCE  ON  THE  OCEAN.  447 

render  military  posts  along  our  northern  frontier,  and  in  the  wilderness  of  the 
West.  Nor  did  she  ever,  in  all  her  dealings  with  us,  from  the  foundation  of 
the  colonies,  act  more  unwisely  than  in  refusing  promptly  to  comply  with 
all  the  obligations  she  had  assumed.  From  the  Treaty  of  Peace,  up  to  the 
time  now  spoken  of,  our  frontier  had  been  desolated  by  the  Indian  tribes  of 
the  North-west ;  and  it  was  not  denied,  that  after  the  perpetration  of  the 
bloodiest  massacres,  and  the  most  atrocious  cruelties  upon  our  helpless  fron- 
tiersmen, these  savages  had  found  safe  and  ready  shelter  from  justice,  when 
ever  they  returned  from  their  incursions,  to  those  same  forts  which  belonged 
to  us  by  virtue  of  the  Treaty  of  1783. 

English  Arrogance  on  the  Ocean. — Another  cause  of  complaint  existed 
in  the  arrogant  pretensions  of  Great  Britain  to  the  entire  dominion  of  the  sea. 
She  was  just  reaching  the  period — so  marked  in  her  history — when  the 
Commercial  Policy,  instead  of  the  acquisition  of  territory,  was  to  become  the 
chief  inspiration  of  her  statesmanship ;  and  to  consummate  her  scheme  she 
must  become  mistress  of  the  ocean,  even  if  it  should  end — as  it  ultimately 
did — in  rousing  the  enmity  of  the  world  against  her.  This  policy,  involving 
the  impressment  of  seamen,  with  the  right  to  search  our  vessels,  could  not  be 
conceded  by  our  government ;  and  it  was  the  source  of  protracted  and  irritat- 
ing debates,  discussions,  and  diplomatic  correspondence.  Down  to  1842, 
when  Daniel  Webster  and  Lord  Ashburton  made  the  celebrated  Treaty  of 
Washington,  this  question  obtruded  itself  on  every  discussion.  It  blocked  up 
the  way  to  friendly  and  advantageous  negotiations  ;  and,  like  the  sword  of 
Damocles,  it  had  hung  menacingly  over  the  head  of  English  and  American 
statesmen,  whenever  they  met  to  talk  about  international  affairs.  England 
was  ready  to  sacrifice  almost  anything  to  win  the  sovereignty  of  the  seas,  and 
she  was  now  sweeping  the  great  fleets  of  France  from  the  ocean.  The  little 
navy  of  the  United  States  was,  in  the  aggregate,  smaller  than  almost  any 
one  of  England's  twenty  squadrons  ;  and  conscious  of  her  relative  strength, 
Britain  presumed  upon  her  superiority  to  assert  principles  which  she  has  never 
been  able  to  enforce  towards  this  country,  and  which  hereafter  she  will  proba- 
bly never  attempt. 

Firmness  of  Washington. — Our  ministers  pressed  these  considerations 
home  upon  the  British  government  with  great  earnestness  and  power — but 
with  no  effect.  Washington  saw  the  necessity  of  adopting  sterner  measures, 
and,  at  his  recommendation,  Congress  passed  bills  laying  an  embargo  for  thirty 
days — erecting  forts  and  fortifications — raising  an  army,  and  organizing  the 
militia  in  all  the  States.  But  while  these  vigorous  measures  were  in  progress, 
Mr.  Jay  was  sent  to  London,  April,  t  794,  to  attempt  to  negotiate  a  treaty, 
which  might  avert,  if  possible,  the  horrors  of  a  Second  War  with  England. 
We  have  an  authenticated  account  of  the  last  conversation  between  Jay  and 
Washington,  before  the  minister  left  for  his  post.  '  I  have  every  confidence,' 
said  the  President,  '  in  your  abilities  for  negotiation,  and  I  have  great  conn* 
dence  in  the  justice  of  our  demands.    You  will,  therefore,  cause  the  British  gov- 


448  WAR  AVERTED  BY  JAY'S   TREATY. 

eminent  most  distinctly  to  understand  that,  much  as  we  deprecate  anothei 
collision  with  England,  and  enfeebled  as  we  still  are  by  the  Revolutionary 
struggle,  we  can  by  no  means  submit  to  injustice  ;  and  if  we  are  compelled 
to  fight  England  the  second  time,  we  shall  take  good  care  to  see  that  it  shall 
not  be  a  war  of  seven  years.' 

Mr.  Jay  was  a  skilful  negotiator,  and  an  accomplished  man.1  He  inspired 
the  greatest  respect,  and  he  was  received  by  the  British  government  with  un- 
expected cordiality.  He  negotiated  a  Treaty  by  which  England  was  to  give 
up  the  posts  she  had  unjustly  retained,  and  indemnify  all  parties  concerned 
for  illegal  captures  ;  while  the  United  States  were  to  hold  three  million  dollars 
in  trust  for  British  subjects,  to  whom  Americans  were  indebted.  Mr.  Jay  also 
made  every  exertion  to  get  England  to  abandon  her  claim  to  the  right  of 
searching  American  merchant  vessels.  But  again,  with  the  same  shortsighted- 
ness of  which  we  have  accused  the  British  ministers  of  a  previous  time,  they 
refused  to  acknowledge  what  they  were  afterward  compelled  to  assent  to  ; 
and  it  was  a  source  of  deep  regret ;  for  the  refusal  in  this  case  caused  her 
war  with  the  United  States.  But  in  the  meantime,  something  had  been 
gained,  and  it  was  perfectly  certain  that  it  would  not  be  given  up.  In  this 
respect  our  Government,  under  all  administrations,  has  held  to  the  policy 
never  to  take  one  step  backward. 

The  Jay  Treaty. — When  Mr.  Jay  returned  with  the  Treaty  in  1795,  it  was 
immediately  laid  before  the  Senate,  where  it  was  the  subject  of  protracted  dis- 
cussion in  secret  session.  Through  inadvertency  or  bad  faith,  an  incorrectly 
printed  copy  got  into  circulation.  The  whole  Treaty  at  once  became  the 
object  of  the  deepest  odium.  Numerous  petitions  were  presented  against  it  ; 
and  on  all  sides  Washington  was  prayed  to  withhold  his  signature.  In  this 
case,  as  in  all  others,  he  received  every  expression  of  the  opinions  of  his 
fellow-citizens  with  perfect  respect,  and  gave  to  them  his  impartial  considera- 
tion.3    But  he  knew  how  much  the  young  Republic  needed  repose,  and  this 

1  Said  Daniel  Webster,  in  a  speech  at  the  City  Hall,     power  in  favor  of  the  Treaty  and  Administration,  won 

for  himself  the  laurels  of  an  unrivalled  orator.     He  was 


New  York,  March  10,  1831  :—k  Another  great  man  we 


then  in  feeble  health  ;  and  when  he  rose  to  speak,  thin 


number  with  the  dead.    I  mean  the  pure,  the  disinter-  an(j  pale,  he  could  hardly  support  himself  on  his  feet, 

ested   patriot,  John  Jay.     His  character  is  a  brilliant  and  his  voice  was  feeble.     Strength  seemed  to  come  as 

...                 ,  .                     c        .       ,      «...  he  warmed   with    the    subject,  and  his  eloquence  and 

jewel  in  the  sacred  treasures  of  national  reputation.  wisdom  pQured  forth  ag  ^  a  mighty  andHinexhausti_ 

Leaving  his  profession  at   an    early  period,    yet  not  ble  fountain.    So  powerful  was  his  speech,  that  a  mem- 

before  he  had    singularly  distinguished  himself  in   it,  ber  opposed  to  him  moved  that  the  question  on  which 

,  .       ,    .    ...     c          .                                .      ,  .,      w»_    ,1.  he  had  spoken  be  postponed  until  the  next  day,    'that 

his  whole  life,  from  the  commencement  of  the  Revolu-  they  sho£d  nota</under  the  influence  of  an  excitement 

tion    until  his  final  retirement,  was  a  life  of  public  Gf  which  their  calm  judgment  might  not  approve.'     In 

service.     The  general  learning  and  ability,  and  especi-  allusion  to   this   speech,    John   Adams   bluntly   said: 

...              ,             .          ..  ,                  «  v.      »                  r  '  There  wasn't  a  dry  eye  in  the  House,  except  some  of 

ally  the  prudence,  the  mildness,   and  the  firmness  of  the  jackasses  that  occasioned  the  necessity  of  the  ora- 

his  character,  eminently  fitted  Mr.    Jay  to  be  the  head  tory.'     Fisher  Ames  was  born  in  Dedham,  Massachu- 

of  such  a  court.     When   the  spotless  ermine  of  the  setts,  in  April,  1756.      His  health  was  delicate  from  in- 

.....       ,,„         T,       -,        •           ,,         ,•       ,  fancy.     He  was  so  precocious  that  he  commenced  the 

judicial  robe  fell  on  John  Jay,  it  touched  nothing  less  ^J  of  Latin  when  six  years  of  age,  and  was  admitted 

spotless  than  itself.'  to  Harvard  College  at  the  age  of  twelve.     He  chose 

2  Fisher  Ames.— The    debates   on  that   occasion—  the  law  for  a  profession,  and  soon  stood  at  the  head  of 

the  confirmation  of  the  Jay  Treaty— developed  talent  the  bar  in  his  native  district.     He  was  a  warm  advo- 

of  the  highest  order,  and  present  a  memorable  epoch  in  cate    of  the  Federal    Constitution.     He  was  the  first 

the  history   of  American    politics  and  statesmanship,  representative  of  his  district  in  the  National  Congress. 

Albert  Gallatin  then  established  his  title  to  the  leader-  He   died   on  4th  of  July,  1808,   at  the  age   of  forty- 

ship  of  the   Opposition   in  the  House  of  Representa-  eight  years.— Lossmg's  Hist.  U.  5.,  p.  380.* 
lives  ;  while  Fisher  Ames,  in  a   speech  of  wonderful 


WASHINGTON  RETIRES  FROM  PUBLIC  LIFE.  449 

man,  who  was  '  first  in  peace/  believing  this  Treaty  to  be  the  best  we  could 
get  at  the  time,  and  that,  on  the  whole,  it  gave  us  some  advantages,  he  wrote 
his  name  to  it  in  defiance  of  public  clamor.  Among  its  beneficial  results 
were  the  allaying  of  hostile  feelings  between  the  two  countries  ;  increased 
facilities  for  negotiating  treaties  of  peace  with  the  western  Indians,  who  could 
no  longer  take  shelter  in  British  fortifications  ;  and  the  new  impulse  given 
to  our  commerce,  by  inspiring  confidence  in  adventure. 

Troubles  with  France. — The  public  affairs  of  France  were  still  in  con- 
fusion, for  Napoleon  Bonaparte  had  not  yet  laid  his  steadying  hand  upon  the 
helm.  Unwise  counsels  prevailed  in  the  foreign,  as  well  as  in  the  domestic 
affairs  of  France.  Irritated  because  she  could  not  sway  us  from  our  policy 
of  neutrality  and  non-intervention,  her  vessels  commenced  a  series  of  depre- 
dations upon  American  commerce.  Wherever  her  cruisers  encountered  our 
ships,  they  were  overhauled  or  captured ;  and  causes  were  in  operation  which 
seemed  to  threaten  a  war  with  our  only  Revolutionary  ally.  Both  countries 
were  ultimately  saved  from  its  curses  by  the  wisdom  of  Napoleon. 

Washington  Retires  from  Public  Life. — The  time  was  now  approaching 
for  another  Presidential  election.  The  Constitution  did  not  preclude  the 
same  man  from  repeated  re-elections  j  yet  Washington  had  resolutely  deter- 
mined to  retire  to  private  life,  and  leave  the  entire  administration  of  national 
affairs  in  the  hands  of  his  successors — thus  setting  an  example  that  estab- 
lished a  precedent,  which  with  all  his  successors  has  been  as  scrupulously  re- 
spected as  though  it  had  been  incorporated  into  the  Constitution.  He  ac- 
cordingly, with  the  aid  of  Alexander  Hamilton,  whom  he  always  consulted 
on  public  affairs,  sent  forth  to  the  people  of  the  United  States  his  immortal 
Farewell  Address,  which  has  ever  been  a  law  to  the  American  people.  Its 
closing  words  sunk  deep  into  the  heart  of  the  nation  : — 

1  Though  in  reviewing  the  incidents  of  my  administration,  I  am  unconscious 
of  intentional  error,  I  am  nevertheless  too  sensible  of  my  defects  not  to  think 
it  probable  that  I  may  have  committed  many  errors.  Whatever  they  may  be, 
I  fervently  beseech  the  Almighty  to  avert  or  mitigate  the  evils  to  which  they 
may  tend.  I  shall  also  carry  with  me  the  hope  that  my  country  will  never  cease 
to  view  them  with  indulgence  ;  and  that  after  forty-five  years  of  my  life  dedi- 
cated to  its  service,  with  an  upright  zeal,  the  faults  of  incompetent  abilities 
will  be  consigned  to  oblivion,  as  myself  must  soon  be  to  the  mansions  of  rest. 

1  Relying  on  its  kindness  in  this  as  in  other  things,  and  actuated  by  that 
fervent  love  towards  it,  which  is  so  natural  to  a  man  who  views  in  it  the  native 
soil  of  himself  and  his  progenitors  for  several  generations,  I  anticipate 
with  pleasing  expectation  that  retreat,  in  which  [  promise  myself  to  realize, 
without  alloy,  the  sweet  enjoyment  of  partaking,  in  the  midst  of  my  fellow- 
citizens,  the  benign  influence  of  good  laws  under  a  free  government — the  ever 
favorite  object  of  my  heart,  and  the  happy  reward  and  trust  of  our  mutual 
cares,  labors,  and  dangers.' 

2Q 


45© 


JOHN  ADAMS  SUCCEEDS  WASHINGTON. 


John  Adams  elected  Washington 's  Successor. — Washington's  Farewell 
Address  produced  a  deep  sensation  throughout  the  country.  It  went  to  every 
house  and  every  heart.  After  its  publication,  the  two  great  political  parties 
of  the  country  began  to  range  themselves  definitively  under  the  leadership  of 
John  Adams,  on  One  side,  and  Thomas  Jefferson1  on  the  other,  both  of  whom 
were  candidates  as  Washington's  successor.  The  struggle  ended  in  the  elec- 
tion of  Adams,  who  was  inaugurated  on  the  4th  of  March,  1797.  Jefferson 
at  the  same  time  became  Vice-President.2 


Insults  of  the  French  Directory. — One  of  the  most  important  events  that 
occurred  under  the  administration  of  Adams,  was  the  insult  which  was  offered 
to  our  government  by  the  French  Directory.  It  was  without  provocation  on 
the  part  of  the  United  States.  The  President  was  requested  by  France  to 
recall  our  Minister  at  Paris,  and  the  request  was  made  in  the  most  offensive 
language.  According  to  the  long  established  usages  of  nations,  this  insult 
would  have  been  considered  a  sufficient  justification  for  suspending  all  inter- 
course betwee  the  two  Powers ;  but  Mr.  Adams  being  deeply  imbued  with  the 
sentiments  of  Washington,  leaned  to  the   side  of  peace,  and  he  appointed 


1  Washington  had  been  especially  sensible  of  the 
talents  and  integrity  displayed  by  Jefferson  during  the 
closing  year  of  his  secretaryship,  and  particularly 
throughout  this  French  perplexity,  and  had  recently 
made  a  last  attempt,  but  an  unsuccessful  one,  to  per- 
suade him  to  remain  in  the  cabinet.  On  the  same  day 
with  his  letter  to  Genet,  Jefferson  addressed  one  to 
Washington,  reminding  him  of  his  having  postponed 
his  retirement  from  office  until  the  end  of  the  annual 
year.  '  That  term  being  now  arrived,'  writes  he,  *  and 
my  propensities  to  retirement  becoming  daily  more  and 
more  irresistible,  I  now  take  the  liberty  of  resigning  the 
office  into  your  hands.  Be  pleased  to  accept  with  it  my 
sincere  thanks  for  all  the  indulgences  you  have  been  so 
good  as  to  exercise  towards  me  in  the  discharge  of  its 
duties.  Conscious  that  my  need  of  them  has  been 
great,  I  have  still  even  found  them  greater,  without  any 
other  claim  on  my  part  than  a  firm  pursuit  of  what  has 
appeared  to  me  to  be  right,  and  a  thorough  disdain  of 
all  means  which  were  not  as  open  and  honorable  as 
their  object  was  pure.  I  carry  into  my  retirement  a 
lively  sense  of  your  goodness,  and  shall  continue  grate- 
fully to  remember  it. ' 

The  following  was  Washington's  reply  :  '  Since  it 
has  been  impossible  to  prevent  you  to  forego  any  longer 
the  indulgence  of  your  desire  for  private  life,  the  event, 
however  anxious  I  am  to  avert  it,  must  be  submitted 
to.  But  I  cannot  suffer  you  to  leave  your  station  with- 
out assuring  you  that  the  opinion  which  I  had  formed 
of  your  integrity  and  talents,  and  which  dictated  your 
original  nomination,  has  been  confirmed  by  the  fullest 
experience,  and  that  both  have  been  eminently  dis- 
played in  the  discharge  of  your  duty.' 

No  one  seemed  to  throw  off  the  toils  of  office  with 
more  delight  than  Jefferson  ;  or  to  betake  himself  with 
more,  devotion  to  the  simple  occupations  of  rural  life.  It 
was  his  boast,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend  written  some  time 
after  his  return  to  Monticello,  that  he  had  seen  no 
newspaper  since  he  had  left  Philadelphia,  and  he  be- 
lieved he  should  never  take  a  newspaper  of  any  other 
sort.  *  I  think  it  is  Montaigne,'  writes  he,  '  who  had 
said,  that  ignorance  is  the  softest  pillow  on  which  a  man 
can  rest  his  head.  I  am  sure  it  is  true  as  to  everything 
political,  and  shall  endeavor  to  estrange  myself  to  every- 
thing of  that  character.'  Yet  the  very  next  sentence 
shows  that  lurking  of  the  old  party  feud.  '  I  indulge 
myself  in  one  political  topic  only — that  is,  in  declaring 
to  my  countrymen  the  shameless  corruption  of  the  re- 
presentatives of  the  first  and  second  Congresses,  and 
their  implicit  devotion  to  the  treasury.' 
. We  subjoin  his  comprehensive  character  of  Wash- 


ington, the  result  of  long  observation  and  cabinet  ex- 
perience, and  written  in  after  years,  when  there  was  no 
temptation  to  insincere  eulogy  ; 

'  His  integrity  was  most  pure  ;  his  justice  the  most 
inflexible  I  have  ever  known  :  no  motives  of  interest  or 
consanguinity,  of  friendship  cr  hatred,  being  able  to 
bias  his  decision.  He  was,  indeed,  in  every  sense  of 
the  word,  a  wise,  a  good,  and  a  great  man.' — Irving's 
Life  0/  Washington,  vol.  v.  pp.  194-196. 

*  On  the  4th  of  March,  an  immense  crowd  gathered 
about  Congress  Hall.  At  eleven  o'clock,  Mr.  Jefferson 
took  the  oath  as  Vice-President  in  the  presence  of  the 
Senate,  and  proceeded  with  that  body  to  the  Chamber 
of  the  House  of  Representatives,  which  was  densely 
crowded,  many  ladies  occupying  chairs  ceded  to  them 
by  members. 

After  a  time,  Washington  entered  amidst  enthusi- 
astic cheers  and  acclamations,  and  the  waving  of 
handkerchiefs.  Mr.  Adams  soon  followed,  and  was 
likewise  well  received,  but  not  with  like  enthusiasm. 
Having  taken  the  oath  of  office,  Mr.  Adams,  in  his 
inaugural  address,  spoke  of  his  predecessor  as  one 
'  who  by  a  long  course  of  great  actions,  regulated  by 
prudence,  justice,  temperance,  and  fortitude,  had 
merited  the  gratitude  of  his  fellow-citizens,  commanded 
the  highest  praises  of  foreign  nations,  and  secured  im- 
mortal glory  with  posterity.' 

At  the  close  of  the  ceremony,  as  Washington  moved 
toward  the  door  to  retire,  there  was  a  rush  from  the 
gallery  to  the  corridor,  that  threatened  the  loss  of  life 
or  limb,  so  eager  were  the  throng  to  catch  a  last  look  of 
one  who  had  so  long  been  the  object  of  public  venera- 
tion. When  Washington  was  in  the  street,  he  waved 
his  hat  in  return  for  the  cheers  of  the  multitude,  his 
countenance  radiant  with  benignity,  his  gray  hairs 
streaming  in  the  wind.  The  crowd  followed  him  to  his 
door  ;  there,  turning  round,  his  countenance  assumed 
a  grave  and  almost  melancholy  expression,  his  eyes 
were  bathed  in  tears,  his  emotions  were  too  great  for 
utterance,  and  only  by  gestures  could  he  indicate  his 
thanks,  and  convey  his  farewell  blessing. 

In  the  evening  a  splendid  banquet  was  given  to  him 
by  the  principal  inhabitants  of  Philadelphia  in  the 
amphitheatre,  which  was  decorated  with  emblematical 
paintings.  All  the  heads  of  departments,  the  foreign 
ministers,  several  officers  of  the  army,  and  various 
persons  of  note  were  present.  Among  the  paintings, 
one  represented  the  home  of  his  heart,  the  home  to 
which  he  was  about  to  hasten — Mount  Vernon.— 
Irving's  Life  0/  Washington,  vol.  v.  pp.  270,  271. 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  HAIL,  COLUMBIA. 


451 


three  envoys  extraordinary  to  the  French  Republic.  But  they  were  subjected 
to  mortification  and  insult  on  their  arrival,  and  there  seemed  to  be  no  alter- 
native but  war.  Congress  made  provisions  for  raising  an  army,  and  for  send- 
ing a  navy  to  sea  j  and  Gen.  Washington  was  appointed  Commander-in-Chief 
of  the  American  forces,  and  he  accepted  the  trust.  The  American  govern- 
ment  had  taken  its  position,  and  orders  were  sent  to  all  its  officers  and  repre- 
sentatives in  every  department,  to  act  with  vigor  in  any  emergency.1 


Victory  of  the  Frigate  Constellation. — Captain  Truxton,  in  command  of  the 
United  States  frigate  Constellation,  fell  in  with  a  French  frigate  L fnsurgente, 
and,  after  a  close  engagement,  captured  her.  Perceiving  a  determined  dis- 
position on  the  part  of  the  American  people  to  sustain  the  government  in  its 
course,  intimations  were  made  to  the  effect  that  the  French  government  would 
be  glad  to  renew  its  friendly  relations  with  the  United  States.  Mr.  Adams 
responded  at  once  to  the  proffer,  and  new  ministers  were  dispatched  to  France. 


1  This  was  the  occasion  which  gave  birth  to  the 
National  Lyric,  which  will  live  in  our  history  16ng 
after  many  a  classic  Ode  and  Epic  of  far  higher  intel- 
lectual and  scholarly  graces  shall  be  forgotten.  Even 
the  most  rustic  tributes  laid  by  the  patriotic  heart  upon 
the  altar  of  patriotism,  are  destined  to  immortality. 

HAIL,    COLUMBIA. 

Hail,  Columbia  !  happy  land  ! 
Hail,  ye  heroes  !  heaven-born  band  ! 
Who  fought  and  bled  in  Freedom's  cause, 
Who  fought  and  bled  in  Freedom's  cause, 
And  when  the  storm  of  war  was  gone, 
Enjoy'd  the  peace  your  valor  won. 
Let  independence  be  our  boast, 
Ever  mindful  what  it  cost ; 
Ever  grateful  for  the  prize, 
Let  its  altar  reach  the  skies. 
Firm — united,  let  us  be, 
Rallying  round  our  Liberty, 
As  a  band  of  brothers  joined, 
Peace  and  safety  we  shall  find. 

Immortal  patriots  !  rise  once  more  ; 
Defend  your  rights,  defend  your  shore ; 

Let  no  rude  foe,  with  impious  hand, 

Let  no  rude  foe,  with  impious  hand, 
Invade  the  shrine  where  sacred  lies 
Of  toil  and  b'ood  the  well-earned  prize. 

While  oF.-ring  peace  sincere  and  just, 

In  he^.en  we  place  a  manly  trust, 

That  truth  and  justice  will  prevail, 

And  every  scheme  of  bondage  fail. 
Firm — united,  etc. 

Sound,  sound  the  trump  of  Fame  ! 
Let  Washington's  great  name 

Ring  through  the  world  with  loud  applause  ; 

Ring  through  the  world  with  loud  applause  ; 
Let  every  clime  to  Freedom  dear 
Listen  with  a  joyful  ear. 

With  equal  skill,  and  godlike  power, 

He  governs  in  the  fearful  hour 

Of  horrid  war ;  or  guides,  with  ease, 

The  happier  times  of  honest  peace. 
Firm — united,  etc. 

Behold  the  chief  who  now  commands, 
Once  more  to  serve  his  country,  stands — ■ 

The  rock  on  which  the  storm  will  beat ; 

The  rock  on  which  the  storm  will  beat ; 
But  arm'd  in  virtue  firm  and  true, 
His  hopes  are  fix'd  on  Heaven  and  you, 

When  Hope  was  sinking  in  dismay, 

And  glooms  obscured  Columbia's  day, 


His  steady  mind,  from  changes  free, 
Resolved  on  death  or  liberty. 
Firm — united,  etc. 

The  late  excellent  Judge  Hopkinson,  a  few  months 
before  his  death,  addressed  to  me  a  letter,  from  which 
I  quote  the  following  account  of  the  circumstances 
attending  the  composition  of  '  Hail,  Columbia.' 

'  It  was  written  in  the  summer  of  1798,  when  war 
was  thought  inevitable.  Congress  was  then  in  session 
in  Philadelphia,  deliberating  upon  that  important  sub- 
ject, and  acts  of  hostility  had  actually  taken  place. 
The  contest  between  England  and  France  was  raging, 
and  the  people  of  the  United  States  were  divided  into 
parties  for  the  one  side  or  the  other ;  some  thinking 
that  policy  and  duty  required  us  to  espouse  the  cause 
of  Republican  France,  as  she  was  called  ;  while  others 
were  for  connecting  ourselves  with  England,  under  the 
belief  that  she  was  the  great  preservative  power  of 
good  principles  and  safe  government.  The  violation 
of  our  rights  by  both  belligerents  was  forcing  us  from 
the  just  and  wise  policy  of  President  Washington, 
which  was  to  do  equal  justice  to  both,  to  take  part  with 
neither,  but  to  preserve  a  strict  and  honest  neutrality 
between  them.  The  prospect  of  a  rupture  with  France 
was  exceedingly  offensive  to  the  portion  of  the  people 
who  espoused  her  cause,  and  the  violence  of  the  spirit  of 
party  has  never  risen  higher,  I  think  not  so  high,  in  our 
country,  as  it  did  at  that  time,  upon  that  question.  The 
theatre  was  then  open  in  our  city.  A  young  man  belong- 
ing to  it,  whose  talent  was  as  a  singer,  was  about  to  take 
his  benefit.  I  had  known  him  when  he  was  at  school. 
On  this  acquaintance  he  called  on  me  one  Saturday 
afternoon,  his  benefit  being  announced  for  the  follow- 
ing Monday.  His  prospects  were  very  disheartening  ; 
but  he  said  if  he  could  get  a  patriotic  song  adapted  to 
the  tune  of  the  "  President's  March,"  he  did  not  doubt 
of  a  full  house  ;  that  the  poets  of  the  theatrical  corps 
had  been  trying  to  accomplish  it,  but  had  not  succeeded. 
I  told  him  I  would  try  what  I  could  do  for  him.  He 
came  the  next  afternoon,  and  the  song,  such  as  is,  was 
ready  for  him.  The  object  of  the  author  was  to  get  up 
an  American  spirit,  which  should  be  independent  of 
and  above  the  interests,  passions,  and  policy  of  both 
belligerents,  and  look  and  feel  exclusively  for  our  own 
honor  and  rights.  No  allusion  is  made  to  France  or 
England,  or  the  quarrel  between  them  ;  or  to  the  ques- 
tion which  was  most  in  fault  in  their  treatment  of  us  ; 
of  course  the  song  found  favor  with  both  parties,  for 
both  were  Americans ;  at  least  neither  could  disavow 
the  sentiments  and  feelings  it  inculcated.  Such  is  the 
history  of  this  song,  which  has  endured  infinitely  be- 
yond the  expectation  of  the  author,  as  it  has  beyond  any 
merit  it  can  boast  of,  except  that  of  being  truly  and 
exclusively  patriotic  in  its  sentiments  and  spirit.' — 
Gris wold's  Poets  and  Poetry  0/  America,  p.  468. 


452  DEATH  OF  WASHINGTON. 

They  found  the  government  in  the  hands  of  Napoleon,  then  First  Consul, 
who  saw  through  the  whole  affair  at  a  glance,  and,  with  keen  discrimination, 
liberal  spirit,  and  wise  policy,  he  met  the  American  Envoys,  and  on  the  30th 
of  September,  1800,  a  satisfactory  Treaty  was  concluded.  From  that  day 
our  intercourse  with  France  has,  with  a  single  transient  and  unimportant  in- 
terruption, been  one  of  entire  harmony  and  complete  mutual  confidence,  in 
the  midst  of  all  the  changes  of  that  chameleon  government. 

Death  of  Washington,  December  14,  1799. — But  an  event  had  already  oc- 
curred in  America  which  had  thrown  the  nation  into  mourning,  and  spread  a 
feeling  of  sadness  through  the  civilized  world.  Washington  was  dead  !  The 
constantly  lessening  number  of  men  now  living,  who  remember  with  great  dis- 
tinctness the  painful  occurrence,  tell  us  that  we  can  form  no  conception  of  the 
emotions  with  which  the  intelligence  was  received  by  a  redeemed  but  be- 
reaved people.  Every  patriotic  man  felt  a  consciousness  of  insecurity  when 
the  mighty  arm  of  Washington,  which  had  been  thrown  around  the  Constitu- 
tion of  the  Union  and  the  glory  of  these  States,  was  struck  by  the  paralysis  of 
death.  In  the  remotest  settlements,  and  in  the  most  populous  cities,  neigh- 
bors grasped  each  other's  hands  in  unbidden  tears  and  said,  ■  Now  that  Wash- 
ington is  gone,  we  must  be  better  men.'  The  hour  of  his  death  was  pre- 
eminently the  period  of  his  triumph.     Of  most  men  it  may  be  said, 

'  The  evil  that  men  do  lives  after  them  ; 
The  good  is  oft  interred  with  their  bones  ; ' 

but  of  Washington  this  can  never  be  said.  Although  he  had  lived  the  noblest 
life  that  had  been  lived  on  earth,  yet  we  may  truthfully  say  that  the  sceptre  of 
his  influence  never  became  supreme  until  he  was  laid  in  the  grave.  Death  is 
the  only  test  of  man.  The  world  can  then  form  an  opinion  without  passion  or 
prejudice,  for  in  the  calm  deliberations  of  the  judgment,  the  disturbing  pas- 
sions of  former  scenes  hold  feeble  sway.  In  the  consciousness  of  their  loss, 
the  American  people,  like  a  single  body  of  men,  bent  in  solemn  reverence 
and  submission  to  the  will  of  heaven,  and  scarcely  any  one  could  tell  whether 
gratitude  for  the  great  services  of  Washington,  or  grief  for  his  loss,  struggled 
strongest  in  his  bosom. 

In  riding  out,  as  was  his  daily  habit,  to  superintend  the  affairs  of  his  plan- 
tation, he  was  overtaken  by  a  storm,  and  returned  home  with  a  chill.  The 
inflammation  settled  in  his  throat,  and  in  defiance  of  medical  skill,  in  the  pres 
ence  of  his  family,  after  only  two  days  of  suffering,  he  tranquilly  died.1     His 

1  At  about  ten  o'clock  Washington  attempted   to  who  sat  by  the  fire.     He  came  to  the  bedside.     The 

speak  to  Mr.  Lear,  but  failed  several  times.     At  length  General's  hand  fell  from  his  wrist.     I  took  it  in  mine 

he  murmured  :  *  I  am  just  going.     Have  me  decently  and  pressed  it  to  my  bosom.     Dr.  Craik  put  his  hands 

buried  ;  and  do  not  let  my  body  be  put  into  the  vault  oyer  his  eyes,  and  he  expired  without  a  struggle  or  a 

in  less  than  three  days  after  I  am  dead.'     Mr.  Lear  sigh. 

could  not  speak,  but  bowed  his  assent.  Washington  'While  we  were  fixed  in  silent  grief,  Mrs.  Wash- 
whispered  :  '  Do  you  understand  ? '  Lear  replied,  ington,  who  was  sitting  at  the  foot  of  the  bed,  asked 
'  Ves.'  l  *Tis  well,'  he  said  ;  and  these  were  the  last  with  a  firm  and  collected  voice,  "  Is  he  gone?"  I  could 
words  he  ever  spoke — i,Tis  well  J "  not  speak,  but  held  up  my  hand  as  a  signal  that  he  was 

'About  ten  minutes  before  he  expired,' says  Mr.  no  more.    '"Tis  well,"1  said  she,  in  the  same  voice  ;  "all 

Lear — '  which  was  between  ten  and  eleven  o'clock —  is  now  over  ;  I  shall  soon  follow  him  ;  I  have  no  more 

his  breathing  became  easier.     He  lay  quietly  ;  he  with-  trials  to  pass  through."  ' 

drew  his  hand  from  mine,  and  felt  his  own  pulse.     I  '  It  may  be  asked,'  says  Mr.  Custis,  '  why  was  the 

saw  his  countenance  change.     I  spoke  to  Dr.  Craik,  ministry  of  religion  wanting  to  shed  its  peaceful  and 


NAPOLEON >S  TRIBUTE  TO  WASHINGTON.  453 

death  was  as  great  and  serene  as  his  life  had  been.  He  was  mourned  by  dis- 
tant nations.  When  Napoleon  received  the  intelligence,  he  exclaimed,  '  The 
great  light  of  the  world  has  gone  out : '  and  taking  the  pen,  in  the  following 
Order  of  the  Day,  he  thus  announced  the  decease  of  the  great  patriot  to  the 
Consular  Guard  and  the  armies  of  France  :  '  Soldiers  :  Washington  is  dead. 
This  great  man  fought  against  tyranny;  he  established  the  liberty  of  his 
country.  His  memory  must  always  be  dear  to  the  French  people,  as  well  as 
to  all  the  people  of  both  worlds,  and  especially  to  the  French  soldiers,  who 
like  him  and  his  American  troops  fight  for  the  defence  of  liberty  and  equality 
— therefore  the  First  Consul  has  ordered  that  for  the  space  of  ten  days,  crape 
shall  be  hung  on  all  the  colors  and  standards  of  the  Republic.' 

'  This  tribute  from  the  greatest  man  in  Europe,  to  the  greatest  man  of 
America,  can  never  be  read  without  emotion.  Nor  can  we  quite  forget  the 
contrast  it  offers  to  the  course  of  the  British  Government.  Sprung  from 
Anglo-Saxon  stock,  descended  from  honorable  English  ancestors,  the  founder 
of  a  New  England  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  that  is  to  perpetuate  the  lan- 
guage, laws,  religion,  arts,  and  civilization  of  Old  England,  to  distant  ages 
and  races  of  men,  it  was  regretted  then,  and  is  regretted  still,  that  Pitt,  who 
held  the  fortunes  of  the  British  Empire  in  his  hands,  did  not  outrival  Na- 
poleon by  some  act  of  veneration  to  the  memory  of  Washington.  For  what 
nation  could  ever  afford  to  be  so  magnanimous  as  England  ? 

The  stream  of  Time,  which  bears  almost  everything  human  to  oblivion, 
passes  without  injury  by  the  everlasting  column  of  Washington's  fame.  Those 
convulsions  which  have  threatened  the  permanence  of  our  union,  and  sickened 
us  with  the  strifes,  the  struggles  and  corruptions  of  parties,  only  render  more 
and  more  dear  the  name  of  the  Father  of  the  American  Republic.  Wherever 
the  all-glowing  sun  lights  up  the  homes  of  earth's  children  ;  through  all  the 
continents  and  islands  ;  along  all  the  shores  and  river-banks  ;  on  every  green 
mountain-side,  and  down  every  blushing  valley,  the  old  tell  his  story  to  the 
young,  and  all  nations  rise  up  and  call  him  blessed.  All  that  belonged  to 
him  has  become  dear  to  mankind  ;  the  ground  his  feet  pressed  is  sacred.  The 
trees  he  planted  with  his  own  hand,  the  groves  through  which  he  walked  at 
evening,  still  seem  to  breathe  his  name  as  they  rustle  their  zephyr  music. 
Even  the  sparkling  ripples  of  that  majestic  stream  which  flows  on  by  Mount 
Vernon,  seem  to  utter  intelligible  words  to  the  ear  of  the  pilgrim  who,  from 
the  green  lawn  in  front  of  the  dwelling,  looks  through  the  bending  boughs  by 
moonlight  on  the  glistening  waters.1 

benign  lustre  upon  the  last  hours    of  Washington  ?  portion  of  every  day  for  more  than  half  a  century,  was 

Why  was  he,  to  whom  the  observances  of  sacred  things  the  venerable  consort,   absorbed  in  silent  prayer,  and 

were  ever  primary  duties  through  life,   without  their  from  which  she  only  arose  when  the  mourning  group 

consolations  in  his  last  moments  ?     We  answer,  cir-  prepared  to  lead  her  from  the  chamber  of  the  dead.' — 

cumstances  did   not  permit.     It  was  but  for  a  little  Lossing's  Home  of  Washington,  pp.  335,  336. 

while  that  the  disease  assumed  so  threatening  a  char-  1  ^  Pilgrimage  to  Mount  Vernon.— On  a  beauti- 

acter  as  to  forbid  the  encouragement  of  hope  ;  yet,  to 

stay  that  summons  which   none   may   refuse,  to  give  ful  spring  morning,  many  years  ago,  we  set  out  from 

still  farther  length  of  days  to  him  whose  time-honored      ,      „     .    ,   _     .  .    4,    .      *.,,  timgt  ,>,-    .    .„    .  „• 

life  was  so  dear  to  mankind,  prayers  were  not  wanting  the  CaPltol>  to  v,slt  for  the  first  time  this  ho,y  shnne 

to  the  throne  of  grace.     Close  to  the  couch  of  the  suf-  0f  Liberty.     The  balmy  air  wafted  through   the  car- 

ferer,  resting  her  head  upon  that  ancient  book,  with 

which  she  had  been  wont  to  hold  pious  communion  a  riage  windows  the  fragrance  of  early  flowers,  just  peep- 


454 


A  PILGRIMAGE  TO  MOUNT  VERNON. 


The  National  Capital  Established  at  Washington. — In  1790,  Congress  had 
made  provision  for  founding  a  Federal  Capital,  and  ten  years  later — Nov., 
1800 — the  seat  of  the  national  government  was  transferred  to  Washington, 
where  a  territory  of  ten  miles  square  had  been  ceded  by  the  States  of  Mary 


ing  from  the  warm  banks  of  the  Potomac.  The  sun 
came  calmly  up  over  the  dome  of  the  Capitol,  and  the 
mist  rose  from  the  river  to  meet  him,  and  then  floated  far 
away,  as  spirits  go  when  they  leave  us  for  the  Better 
Land.  We  could  not  say  there  was  a  gay  heart  among 
us,  although  it  was  our  first  reunion  after  many  years' 
wanderings  in  distant  lands.  But  we  were  approach- 
ing the  spot  where  the  greatest  and  purest  of  men  rested 
from  his  labors,  and  we  felt  that  mirth  had  no  place  in 
our  feelings,  and  into  that  day  levity  could  not  enter. 

Passing  the  porter's  lodge  we  rode  on  slowly  a  great 
distance,  threading  our  way  sometimes  through  deep 
ravines,  from  which  only  the  upper  sky  was  visible,  and 
then  emerging  on  eminences  from  which  we  hoped  to 
get  a  glimpse  of  the  mansion  ;  but  holy  feelings -filled 
up  the  intervals.  We  were  on  ground  new  to  us,  where, 
warm  a"nd  radiant  with  beneficence,  the  form  of  the 
hero  had  so  often  passed.  Even  the  air  seemed  haunt- 
ed by  his  presence.     Every  step  we  took  was  an  epic. 

One  of  our  companions,  a  gifted  man,  and  a  great 
artist  now,  traced  the  oudines  of  the  historical  picture. 
Passing  the  same  rugged  avenue,  first,  the  Youth, 
George  Washington,  with  his  surveying  instruments, 
to  measure  the  vast  wilderness  of  the  west,  which  he 
was  afterwards  to  offer  his  brothers  made  free — 
Major  Washington,  setting  out  to  the  war,  to  pre- 
pare them  to  achieve  their  independence—  Colonel 
Washington,  on  his  departure  to  repel  foreign  and 
savage  invaders — the  Representative  going  to  and 
from  the  congress  of  the  rebels— the  General,  starting 
forth  again  to  the  struggles  of  the  Revolution— the 
Farmer,  going  and  returning  from  his  fields  of  cul- 
ture—the President,  on  his  way  to  administer  the 
government  of  a  people  he  had  led  to  freedom  ;  and 
last  of  all,  the  Citizen  Washington,  who  had  scorned 
a  crown  as  too  base  a  reward  for  his  long  services — re- 
turning by  the  same  road  we  were  travelling,  his  great 
heart  filled  with  longings  for  home. 

We  passed  the  gateway  to  the  mansion  ;  a  ruin  it 
seemed  to  us,  for  it  had  long  been  uncared  for  ;  and 
yet  it  was  clothed  with  glory.  It  was  not  a  feudal 
Castle,  on  many  of  which  we  had  so  recently  gazed  in 
Europe,  with  a  deep  trench  once  filled  with  water  ;  nor 
was  there  a  drawbridge,  over  which  once  clattered  the 
hoofs  of  warriors'  steeds  ;  nor  massive  arches,  under 
which  bent  plumes  of  knights  ;  nor  spacious  court-yard, 
on  which  the  spears  of  a  heroic  band  flashed  in  the 


moonlight ;  there  was  no  vast  banqueting-hall  that 
once  rang  to  the  clamor  of  crusaders  ;  nor  the  merry 
shout  of  victorious  warriors  who  had  come  from  meas- 
uring lances  with  the  infidel,  to  tell  their  tales  of  hero- 
ism in  the  starded  ears  of  Europe.  There  was  no 
watchword,  no  vesper-chime  stealing  sofdy  on  the 
evening  air,  no  holy  chant  or  monkish  prayer  in 
gloomy  castle  ;  no  solemn  moonlight  watch  on  over- 
looking tower — no  one  of  all  these :  but  there  was 
something  grander,  better,  dearer  than  all  this  heroic 
legend.  It  was  the  home  of  the  father  of  a  great  and 
free  nation,  whose  eagle's  wings  how  sweep  from  the 
turbulent  Adantic,  far  away  over  rich  valleys,  dotted 
with  happy  habitations,  and  walled  by  rugged  moun- 
tain ranges,  and  wide  rivers,  and  broad  prairies,  to  the 
far-off  peaceful  ocean  where  empire  looks  towards 
the  purple  east,  and  has  made  the  circuit  of  the  globe. 
But  it  was  a  ruin  !  The  master  of  the  house  had  long 
since  gone  '  to  another  country,  and  time  had  left  the 
mansion,  like  some  banquet-hall,  deserted.'  The  mas- 
ter would  never  return. 

The  servants  told  us  that  the  present  master  would 
next  year  repair  the  dwelling.  '  Oh,  no  ; '  we  said, 
1  leave  it  as  he  left  it ;  you  cannnot  make  good  his 
place.  Eternity  is  his  dwelling  now.  Let  time  spread 
his  never-sear  kindly  over  the  mansion,  so  that  the 
winds  blow  not  too  harshly  against  it ;  for  the  great 
master  is  gone,  and  will  return  no  more.'  ■ 

They  showed  us  all  the  apartments  which  were  at 
diat  time  open  to  visitors.  We  had  letters,  but  we  would 
accept  no  privileges  there  which  were  not  granted  to 
all.  We  saw  the  hall,  the  drawing-room,  the  parlor, 
and  the  dining-room,  with  its  richly  sculptured  mantel- 
piece which  Lafayette  sent  to  him  ;  and  in  passing  out 
under  the  open  sky,  they  pointed  out  to  us  the  chamber 
where  Washington  died.  They  showed  us  the  lemon- 
tree  he  planted.  It  was  old,  but  green  still.  Many 
plants  in  the  conservatory,  with  long,  box  alleys,  and 
large  squares,  and  page  bushes,  all  planned  and  plant- 
ed by  his  hand.  Down  the  green  slope  towards  the 
river,  not  far  from  the  bank,  we  slowly  and  reverently 
gathered  and  bowed  before  Washington's  tomb,  in 
gratitude,  silence,  and  tears. 

As  the  sun  was  going  down,  flooding  the  clouds  with 
purple  and  gold,  we  entered  the  boat,  and  sailed  slowly 
by,  under  the  lengthening  shadows  of  the  sacred  groves 
which  cluster  their  foliage  around  Mount  Vernon. 


JEFFERSON  AND  HIS  ADMINISTRATION.  455 

land  and  Virginia,  and  suitable  edifices  prepared.  The  territory  was  named 
the  District  of  Columbia,  and  the  Capital  called  after  the  Father  of  the  Re- 
public. In  the  feebleness  of  our  infant  State,  the  buildings  for  the  public 
offices,  and  even  the  Capitol  itself,  were  raised  without  great  expense,  and 
with  no  architectural  pretensions.  It  was  well ;  for,  a  few  years  later,  during 
the  second  war  with  England,  they  were  barbarously  burned.  But  they  have 
risen  from  their  ruins  in  colossal  magnificence. 

Election  of  Thomas  Jefferson. — The  fourth  Presidential  Election  was  ap- 
proaching. In  consequence  chiefly  of  the  Alien  Law,  which  was  a  favorite 
measure  of  John  Adams,  and  which  authorized  the  President  to  exile  any 
foreigner  from  the  country,  if,  in  his  judgment,  he  became  dangerous  to  the 
peace  and  liberty  of  the  United  States  ;  and  of  the  Sedition  Law,  which  levied 
fines  and  imprisonments  upon  all  who  should  write,  print,  utter  or  publish 
anything  that  was  false,  malicious,  or  scandalous  against  the  government,  the 
President,  etc.,  John  Adams  had  excited  against  him  so  much  public  odium, 
that  he  had  no  chance  whatever  of  re-election.  By  the  original  provisions  of 
the  Constitution,  the  voters  of  every  congressional  district  chose  an  elector, 
who  cast  his  vote  for  the  two  men  of  his  choice,  without  naming  which  should 
be  President ;  but  the  one  who  had  a  majority  of  the  votes  was  made  Presi- 
dent, while  the  second  became  Vice-President.  In  this  election,  the  Repub- 
licans had  a  large  majority  over  the  Federalists,  and  they  threw  all  their  votes 
for  Thomas  Jefferson  and  Aaron  Burr.  Burr  had  distinguished  himself,  in  the 
early  period  of  the  Revolution,  as  one  of  the  most  gallant  young  officers  in 
the  service.  He  had  subsequently  achieved  great  eminence  at  the  bar,  and 
in  political  life.  He  was  now  on  the  point  of  reaching  the  Presidency  ;  and 
when,  in  consequence  of  his  having  the  same  number  of  electoral  votes  as  Jef- 
ferson, the  election  devolved  upon  the  House  of  Representatives,  a  strong 
and  protracted  struggle  took  place,  in  which  thirty-five  unsuccessful  attempts 
were  made  by  the  popular  branch  of  the  National  Congress  before  the  result 
was  decided.  It  had,  in  fact,  been  delayed  so  long,  that  it  was  necessary  to 
make  some  choice,  or  there  would  be  no  President  of  the  United  States. 
Finally,  Jefferson,  by  adroit  management,  gained  a  majority  of  one,  and  was 
elected.  Colonel  Burr  became  Vice-President.  A  weak  spot  had  been  found 
in  the  Constitution ;  but  this  danger  was  never  again  encountered,  for  the 
necessary  amendment  to  our  organic  statutes  was  made. 

Jefferson's  Administration. — Jefferson,  was  now  President,  and  for  a  long 
period  he  powerfully  influenced  the  fortunes  of  our  government  and  people. 
Removed  from  those  times,  and  exempt  from  their  party  influences,  we  con- 
template his  administration  with  calmness  and  impartiality  ;  and  it  is  only 
just  to  that  great  man,  to  say,  that  he  devoted  all  his  energies,  in  an  enlight- 
ened spirit,  to  the  prosperity  of  the  United  States.  Longsightedness  and 
political  prudence  have  been  denied  him  ;  but  only  by  those  who  neither  com- 
prehended his  character,  the  nature  of  our  institutions,  nor  the  spirit  of  the 


456         ACQUISITION  OF  THE  TERRITORY  OF  LOUISIANA. 

times.  Soon  after  his  inauguration,  an  event  happened  which  tested  his 
qualities  as  a  statesman ;  and  time  has  put  upon  his  action  a  final  seal  ol 
approbation. 

The  Purchase  of  the  Territory  of  Louisiana. — Spain,  once  the  mistress  of 
the  Western  Continent,  which  had  been  discovered  and  colonized  under  her 
agency  and  auspices,  had  suddenly  erected  a  vast  empire  in  the  Western 
World ;  but  for  a  century  and  a  half  she  had  been  declining,  until  she  had 
grown  so  weak  that  she  had  ceded  to  France  the  territory  of  Louisiana. 
When  that  act  went  into  effect,  the  executive  agents  of  the  Spanish  govern- 
ment publicly  proclaimed  that  the  Port  of  New  Orleans  was  closed  against  the 
commerce  of  the  United  States.  This  cut  off  our  Western  States  and  Terri- 
tories from  all  access  to  the  ocean.  It  was  evident  that  western  commerce 
had  nothing  but  ruin  to  contemplate,  for  at  this  time  there  was  no  practicable 
way  of  reaching  the  ocean,  except  over  the  broad  bosom  of  the  Mississippi 
River.  Alarm  spread  through  the  whole  western  country.  Jefferson,  with 
eagle  eye,  saw  only  one  recourse  left.  He  consequently  instructed  the 
American  Minister  to  France,  to  propose  the  purchase  of  the  Territory  of 
Louisiana.  Napoleon  entertained  the  idea,  and  a  treaty  was  soon  made,  by 
which  this  enormous  acquisition  fell  into  our  hands  for  the  trivial  considera- 
tion of  sixteen  millions.  The  area  of  the  Union  was  multiplied  almost  two  to 
one — the  broad  and  magnificent  valley  of  the  Mississippi  on  the  West  was 
joined  to  the  Republic,  and  it  now  stretched  to  the  Pacific.  Since  the  death 
of  Washington,  no  event  of  equal  importance  had  occurred.  It  was,  as  sub- 
sequent years  have  so  signally  shown,  a  far-reaching  stroke  of  statesman- 
ship. 

War  Proclaimed  against  the  Barbary  Powers. — Hitherto  our  European 
relations  had  been  limited  chiefly  to  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Holland ;  but 
circumstances  occurred  which  brought  us  into  collision,  unexpectedly,  with  the 
Barbary  Powers  on  the  northern  coast  of  Africa.  Since  the  close  of  the 
Revolution,  which  unfettered  our  shipping,  American  commerce  had  begun  to 
whiten  every  sea.  It  already  held  the  monopoly  of  dried  fish  and  whale  oil 
in  the  Mediterranean,  with  a  most  profitable  carrying  trade  in  the  products 
of  the  East  and  West  Indies.  -  For  a  long  time  the  inhabitants  of  the  Bar- 
bary States  had  been  known  chiefly  as  the  pirates  of  the  Mediterranean. 
They  ventured  off  from  their  coasts  to  commit  depredations  upon  the  com- 
merce of  every  power  which  did  not  pay  them  an  annual  tribute.  The 
governments  of  Europe  had,  in  a  cowardly  spirit,  submitted  to  this  indignity, 
and  even  the  United  States,  for  a  while,  consented,  like  other  commercial  na- 
tions, to  pay  a  certain  sum  every  year  for  the  privilege  of  cutting  the  waters 
of  the  Mediterranean  with  the  prows  of  their  vessels.  But  the  insult — when 
the  nation  turned  its  attention  to  it — could  no  longer  be  borne.  War  was 
declared  against  Tripoli.  This  was  a  great  and  important  step  for  our  govern* 
ment  to  take.     The  war  itself  was  neither  signal  nor  protracted.      It  was 


WAR  WITH  TRIPOLI.  457 

attended  by  few  startling  incidents,  but  it  had  immense  results  upon  the  naval 
character  and  discipline  of  the  Americans,  and  gave  a  new  impetus  to  out 
growing  trade  with  the  Mediterranean. 

Decatur  and  Eato?i  at  Tripoli. — Commodore  Preble  was  sent  to  the 
Mediterranean,  in  1803,  to  prosecute  the  war.  The  frigate  Philadelphia, 
one  of  his  principal  ships,  had  grounded  in  the  harbor  of  Tripoli,  and  her 
officers  and  men  were  reduced  to  Mohammedan  slavery.  The  whole  affair 
was  managed  with  discretion,  diplomatically,  and  with  great  daring  and  intre- 
pidity, by  the  American  officers.  Stephen  Decatur,  a  lieutenant  under  the  flag, 
boarded  the  Philadelphia,  where  she  lay  stranded  in  those  tideless  waters, 
under  the  guns  of  Tripoli,  set  her  on  fire,  and  escaped.  The  American 
commander  had  authority  to  make  common  cause  with  an  expelled  rival  of 
the  Bashaw,  to  aid  him  in  recovering  his  authority,  with  the  understanding  that 
our  countrymen  were  to  be  released.  General  William  Eaton,  then  consul 
at  Alexandria,  with  a  small  American  force,  headed  the  exiled  Bashaw's  Arab 
army,  marched  a  thousand  miles — part  of  the  route  across  the  Barcan  desert — 
to  the  territory  of  Tripoli,  and  defeated  the  Tripolitans  in  two  engagements, 
— 1805,  which  enabled  the  Americans  to  negotiate  a  treaty  by  which  their 
captive  brethren  were  set  at  liberty.  This  achievement  resounded  through 
Europe.  It  was  a  brilliant  example  of  heroism  and  wise  policy  offered  to  the 
governments  of  the  Old  World;  and  the  chastisement,  as  a  ?natter  of  prin- 
ciple, of  a  Barbary  Power  that  attempted  to  make  might  right,  was  applauded 
by  all  civilized  nations. 

The  Duel  between  Hamilton  and  Burr. — We  now  reach  a  painful  inci- 
dent in  our  national  history — the  death  of  Alexander  Hamilton,  who  was  shot 
by  Aaron  Burr,  in  1804.  Burr  was  then  Vice-President.  He  had  never 
liked  Hamilton,  nor  had  Hamilton  ever  liked  him.  Gifted  with  great  ability 
as  a  commander  ;  no  more  ambitious,  perhaps,  than  Hamilton  himself,  but 
ambitious  in  another  direction  ;  fixing  his  eye  at  an  early  period  upon  the 
Presidency  ;  adequate  to  the  discharge  of  its  duties  and  honorable  enough 
to  fulfil  all  the  obligations  he  would  assume  ;  entertaining,  too,  political  prin- 
ciples and  views  far  more  democratic  than  those  of  Hamilton — irritated  by  a 
long  series  of  insulting  articles,  arguments,  and  diatribes  in  the  newspapers 
which  favored  Hamilton — Burr  at  last  grew  so  indignant  that  he  no  longer 
attempted  to  restrain  his  indignation  and  contempt,  and  he  challenged  Ham- 
ilton to  mortal  combat.  Hamilton  was  a  great  and  courageous  man  ;  but  he 
was  not  great  and  courageous  enough  to  hurl  back  the  challenge,  or  dis 
claim  the  ignominious  charges  he  had  openly  made  against  his  hated  rival ;  nor 
had  he  the  daring  to  defy  the  poisoned  shafts  of  malice,  and  let  them  break 
against  the  shield  of  his  honor.  He  met  Burr  on  the  bank  of  the  Hudson, 
a  short  distance  above  Hoboken,  opposite  New  York  •  and,  as  was  alleged 
by  his  friends  at  the  time,  without  attempting  to  kill  his  foe,  opened  his  breast 
to  the  deadly  and  fatal  aim  of  his  antagonist.     Hamilton  died,  and  the  nation 


458  THE  B URR-HAMIL  TON  D  UEL. 

sustained  an  irreparable  loss.  Burr  lived  to  an  advanced  age,  but  the  shadow 
of  the  great  disaster  followed  him  to  his  grave.  He  never  attempted,  to 
remove  the  stigma.  Those  who  knew  him  best  esteemed  him  most;  nor  least 
of  all,  perhaps,  for  the  proud  disdain  with  which  he  looked  down  upon  the  cabal 
who  had  first  plotted  his  death,  and  whose  foiled  malice  followed  him  to  his 
tomb  with  unrelenting  bitterness.  The  first  justice  ever  done  to  him  by  the 
pen  of  history  was  by  James  Parton. 

Burr's  True  Character. — The  stars  fought  against  Aaron  Burr,  or  he 
would  have  laid  the  capstone  to  the  summit  of  his  ambition.  From  the  time 
that  he  was  achieving  his  brilliant  feats  of  chivalry  in  the  expedition  to  Canada, 
his  eye  was  fixed  upon  nothing  less  than  the  acquisition  of  the  highest  fame. 
He  rose  gradually  from  point  to  point,  until  he  remained  almost  without  a 
rival  j  and  had  there  been  one  single  element  more  in  his  composition  with 
which  Jefferson  was  so  munificently  supplied — appearance  of  sympathy  for  the 
masses — every  obstacle  would  have  given  way  before  him,  and  he  would  have 
triumphantly  reached  the  Presidency.  No  man  has  flourished  under  the 
American  Republic  who  was  gifted  with  such  rare  and  commanding  abilities. 
His  immense  faculty  of  analysis  ;  his  keenness  of  satire  ;  his  all  but  incredible 
self-control ;  his  power  of  comprehension,  generalization,  and  crystallization  of 
thought  and  principle  ;  his  wealth  of  illustration  ;  the  fervid  power  of  his  fancy  ; 
the  artistic  delineations  of  his  nomenclature  ;  his  arrangement  of  words  ;  his 
construction  of  sentences  ;  the  darting  fierceness  with  which  he  shot  his  bolts 
of  fire  ;  and  the  imposing  awe  which  his  satire  inspired  in  the  forum, — were 
but  a  few  of  his  more  common  attributes.  But  the  secret  of  his  real  power 
has  never  been  understood,  and  never  will  be,  except  by  those  who  com- 
prehend the  subtle  elements  that  enter  into  the  constitution  of  genius. 

Aaron  Burr  had  the  keenest  and  most  sensitive  appreciation  of  woman. 
There  is  little  doubt  that  his  vices  have  oeen  exaggerated,  for  contempora- 
neous history  has  always  been  characterized  by  superfluous  tintings  of  every 
quality  which  the  mass  of  mankind  could  understand,  because  they  belong 
to  their  own  sympathies  and  feelings.  Burr  was  doubtless  a  man  of  great 
gallantry;  he  swayed  an  almost  omnipotent  sceptre  over  the  passions  of 
woman.  He  was  an4  eminently  handsome  man;  his  manners  were  more 
courtly  than  those  that  are  ever  contracted  in  scenes  of  nobility,  royalty, 
and  imperial  splendor.  He  had  around  him  the  atmosphere  that  emanates 
from  the  most  gifted  and  brilliant  genius.  High-born  and  graceful  women  are 
proud  to  be  loved  by  those  who  draw  forth  all  their  admiration,  and  inflame 
all  the  fire  of  their  fancy.  Take  him  all  for  all,  Aaron  Burr  was  the  most 
gifted,  brilliant,  and  chivalrous  man  that  has  flourished  in  this  country.  He 
was  mixed  up  with  all  the  heated  passions  of  his  age ;  his  reputation  was 
dragged  through  the  streets  as  the  body  of  Hector  was  dragged  around 
the  walls  of  Troy.  His  collision  with  Hamilton,  ending  in  the  death  of  the 
champion  of  the  Federalists,  the  intimate  friend,  secretary  and  minister  of 
Washington,  rolled  upon  him  the  odium  of  a  great  political  party.     He  en- 


THE  TRUE  MERITS  OF  THE  COMBATANTS. 


459 


countered  it  wherever  he  went.  At  that  time  the  press  of  the  country  was  in 
the  hands  of  Burr's  enemies,  and  it  rang  out  in  broad,  clear,  high-sounding 
notes  the  infamy  of  'the  murderer  of  Alexander  Hamilton.'  This  latter 
epithet  should  in  any  event  have  been  spared,  since  Hamilton  and  his  friends 
held  as  firmly  to  the  '  Code  of  Honor '  as  Burr  and  his  partisans.  But  now, 
when  the  mists  of  contemporaneous  passion  have  passed  away,  and  we  look 
calmly  upon  the  men  and  the  events  of  those  times,  we  are  disposed  to  pay  a 
slight  tribute  of  justice  to  a  man  who,  till  recently,  had  found  no  vindicator.1 


1  The  following  estimate  of  the  Hamilton-Burr  case 
was  made  up  many  years  ago  by  a  gentleman  per- 
haps as  thoroughly  informed  as  almost  any  man,  of  the 
circumstances,  and  signally  qualified  to  pass  a  judgment 
on  the  characters  of  these  two  extraordinary  personages. 
He  was  the  only  man  I  ever  knew  who  always  seemed 
to  speak  without  prejudice  against  either,  his  admira- 
tion for  both  being  diminished  only  by  his  thorough 
contempt  for  the  duellist's  code.  As  it  differs  very  widely 
from  the  judgments  passed  by  most  of  the  contem- 
poraries of  Hamilton  and  Burr,  I  have  thought  it  might 
be  read  with  some  interest.  I  prepared  it  with  great 
care  from  verbatim  notes  of  many  conversations, 
stretching  through  a  period  of  over  twenty-five  years. 

1  The  merits  of  the  case  as  between  Hamilton  and 
Burr  are  very  readily  summed  up.  They  began  as 
rivals  ;  and  well  they  might  be,  for  each  had  a  foeman 
worthy  of  his  steel.  They  were  the  two  most  gifted 
and  brilliant  men  in  America.  All  that  nature  could 
do  for  them  had  been  done.  Profusely  endowed  with 
her  priceless  gifts  and  graces,  and  petted  and  spoiled 
as  both  of  them  were  by  the  maddening  applause  of 
the  world  ;  both  fairly  entitled  to  it  by  deeds  of  valor 
in  the  field,  by  eloquence  in  the  forum  and  the  Senate, 
but  in  all  other  things  as  wide  asunder  as  earth  and 
heaven,  they  could  not  meet  on  equal  terms,  any  more 
than  two  suns  can  shine  in  one  hemisphere.  It  was 
plain  enough  that  one  of  them  must  give  way.  Backed 
by  two  parties  which  constituted  the  whole  nation,  in 
which  not  a  man  or  woman  stood  indifferent ;  beloved 
and  admired  alike  by  their  partisans  who  were  nearly 
matched  in  numbers,  the  entire  country  was  lashed  into 
passion,  and  it  raged  wilder  among  the  people  than  it 
did  in  the  breasts  of  those  rivals  themselves,  each  of 
whom  was  absolutely  master  of  himself,  except  in  this  : 
The  one  was  brought  up  in  the  school  of  Washington, 
under  restraints  as  severe,  and  a  discipline  as  merciless 
as  the  master-spirit  and  founder  of  the  Company  of 
Jesus  ever  devised  or  enforced  ;  he  had,  unconsciously 
to  himself  perhaps,  learned  to  have  no  absolute  will  of 
his  own ;  while  Burr  never  had  learned,  and  never 
could  learn  how  to  have  a  master.  He  was  born  not  to 
obey,  but  to  command.  He  made  public  opinion  ; 
Hamilton  bowed  to  it.  The  one  spent  his  whole  poli- 
tical life  in  a  cage — an  eagle,  if  you  will ;  the  other 
never  knew  what  such  fetters  were.  He  breathed  the 
ttmosphere  of  the  wildest  liberty  ;  the  freedom  of  the 
primeval  woods  themselves  was  not  freer  than  the 
world  where  Aaron  Burr  lived,  and  moved,  and  had 
his  being. 

'  Besides,  Hamilton  had  erected  propriety,  rather 
thaq  virtue,  into  a  divinity.    Burr  had  a  keener  sense  of 


beauty  ;  his  whole  nature  was  suffused  with  the  glow 
of  passion  ;  and  yet  he  was  more  completely  master  of 
himself  than  Hamilton  ever  learned  how  to  be.  Duel- 
ling was  becoming  disreputable  ;  but  not  in  the  school 
of  chivalry  where  Burr  belonged,  nor  in  the  school  of 
chivalry  where  Hamilton  had  been  trained  ;  but  still,  as 
Hamilton's  friends  had  always  put  him  forward  as  the 
champion  of  virtue  and  propriety,  and  Burr  as  exactly 
the  opposite,  the  virtues  of  the  one  being  as  shame- 
lessly exaggerated  as  the  vices  of  the  other,  Hamilton 
did  not  dare  disobey  the  behest  of  public  opinion  which 
required  the  challenged  man  to  go  out.  ' 

'//  ivaf  all  the  work  of  their  adherents  and 
partisans.'1'' — There  is  no  doubt  that  either  wished  the 
other  one  out  of  the  way.  But  Burr  was  well  enough 
satisfied  in  measuring  his  lance  with  his  antagonist  in 
the  Senate,  or  before  the  bar  of  supreme  tribunals. 
Burr's  faith  in  his  own  superiority  was  so  m-\ch 
stronger  than  Hamilton's,  that  the  latter  felt  there  v»as 
no  resource  left  for  his  reputation  for  courage,  except 
to  take  the  field. 

'  But  the  press  of  the  country,  then  limited  in  num- 
bers and  circulation,  but  unscrupulous  to  the  last 
degree  of  decency,  honor,  or  truth,  was  under  the 
supreme  control  of  Hamilton  and  his  friends.  They 
had  provoked  hostilities  :  they  had  maligned  and  as- 
sailed Burr  in  every  relation  of  life  ;  they  had  goaded 
his  friends  to  desperation  by  their  meanness  and  atro- 
cious assaults  ;  nothing  was  sacred  from  the  pens  of 
the  writers  of  these  journals  :  not  a  single  issue  of 
their  sheets  would  to-day  be  read  aloud,  or  admitted 
to  any  decent  family  in  America.  Libel  was  no  name  for 
these  assaults.  And  all  this  was  done  under  the  garb 
of  superior  sanctity,  that  was  claimed  for  Alexander 
Hamilton  ;  a  man  whose  personal  deeds  became  by 
his  own  voluntary  consent,  the  property  of  mankind, 
and  an  honest  recital  of  which  would  bring  a  blush 
to  the  face  of  any  decent  woman  in  America. 

•  That  press  which  had  provoked  the  quarrel,  and 
which  was  supposed  to  have  expended  its  last  drop  of 
venom  upon  the  personal  character  of  Aaron  Burr,  was 
now  fired  by  the  spirit  of  a  deeper  malignity — intensified 
by  the  bitterness  of  baffled  hopes.  Their  hero  was 
dead  ;  his  antagonist  was  living.  And  when  they 
could  no  longer  plot  for  his  blood,  they  determined  to 
pursue  him  with  unrelenting  malignity,  and  they  did. 
They  made  him  an  outcast,  an  exile  ;  the  leader  of 
their  party,  from  the  Presidential  office,  was  made  the 
tool  of  their  passions  ;  and  from  that  seat  he  sent 
malign  orders  to  our  representatives  in  Europe,  and 
even  asked  as  a  favor  from  the  rotten  thrones  of  tho 
Old  World  that  Burr  should  there  find  no  city  of  refuge. 

'  But  time  at  last  makes  all  things  even.     Burr 


460 


REAL  OBJECTS  OF  BURR'S  EXPEDITION. 


Another  War  Cloud  Rising. — This  country  seemed  again  upon  the  eve  of 
hostilities  with  France  and  England.  Both,  in  their  collisions  with  each 
other,  had  carelessly  and  wrongfully  intrenched  upon  the  field  of  our  legiti- 
mate commerce.     England  had  swept  the  ocean — the  victories  of  the  Nile 


waited  long  for  justice ;  it  was  meted  out  to  him  in 
some  measure,  at  last,  and  in  a  candid  and  manly 
spirit,  by  James  Parton,  in  his  exhaustive  and  captivat- 
ing Life  and  Times  of  Aaron  Burr.'' — Two  vols. 
Osgood.  &*  Co.,  Boston. 

This  same  gentleman  used  to  listen  with  a  smile 
of  peculiar  derision  to  the  slurs  cast  upon  Burr's  patrio- 
tism, by  those  who  had  not  the  merit  of  knowing  even 
in  what  the  crime — if  it  were  one — for  which  he  was  in- 
dicted, had  consisted. 

'  But  for  the  same  motives  of  political  ambition  and 
personal  animosity,'  said  he,  '  no  prosecution  for  trea- 
son would  ever  have  been  brought  against  Aaron  Burr. 
Nobody  who  knew  anything  about  the  case  at  the 
time,  had  any  belief  that  Burr  meditated  any  scheme 
hostile  to  the  Union  of  the  United  States  ;  while  those 
most  in  his  confidence  were  satisfied  of  exacdy  the  con- 
trary. They  doubdess  understood  that  his  real  inten- 
tions were,  if,  after  surveying  the  ground,  he  should 
find  that  the  scheme  was  practicable  to  revolutionize 
the  political  condition  of  the  Spanish  possessions  north 
of  the  Isthmus,  and  organize  them  into  a  new  and  pow- 
erful political  confederation— to  drive  out  the  Spanish 
power  from  North  America,  and  from  the  whole  West 
Indian  Archipelago,  and  bring  those  vast  dominions 
and  their  degraded  population  into  the  light  of  civil 
and  religious  freedom.  So  far  as  purity  of  political 
motives  went,  I  know  not  why  he  was  not  to  be  credited 
with  as  high  an  inspiration  in  behalf  of  liberty  as  was 
Lafayette  ;  nor  have  I  ever  had  any  doubt  that  if  he 
had  not  been  interfered  with  by  that  silly  trial  in  the 
District  Court  of  the  United  States,  he  would  have 
carried  his  great  purpose  into  effect.  He  was  a  man 
of  infinitely  grander  political  conceptions  than  Lafay- 
ette, or  even  Jefferson.  In  fact,  there  was  no  American 
of  his  time,  nor  has  there  ever  been  one  since,  who  had 
so  vast  an  idea  of  what  might  have  been  accomplished 
by  a  few  bold  and  gallant  spirits  to  lead  the  way  in 
rescuing  those  mighty  regions  from  the  control  of  so 
degrading  and  besotted  a  power  as  Spain.  As  for  any 
shallow  notions  of  the  establishment  of  an  empire  on 
this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  Burr  was  a  man  of  too  much 
learning  and  political  sagacity  to  entertain  any  such 
cloudy  dream.  He  was  a  man  of  sharp  perceptions  ; 
he  entertained  no  fancies  when  business  was  on  hand. 
He  was  most  merciless  in  his  analysis  of  facts  ;  he  had 
least  faith  in  moonshine  ;  he  had  no  confidence  in  the 
strength  of  the  monarchical  principle  in  the  future.  He 
believed  in  the  supremacy  of  mind  ;  and  so  far  as  that 
sway  went,  he  was  born  to  control  in  a  higher  sense 
than  Jackson,  or  Jefferson,  and  had  always  accom- 
plished whatever  he  had  undertaken,  with  more  ease, 
with  less  machinery,  and  with  more  directness,  than 
any  cf  the  successful  leaders  of  our  Revolution,  or  of 
our  politics  after  we  had  established  a  government. 

1  Burr  had  infinite  faith  in  the  ultimate  triumph  of 
democracy.  He  was  a  better  and  a  stronger  democrat 
than  even  Jackson  himself.  He  never,  at  any  moment 
of  his  life,  had  any  doubt  about  the  success  of  our 


arms  in  the  Revolution,  or  of  our  political  polity.  Ha 
saw  the  result  clearly  from  the  beginning.  He  was  a 
born  soldier,  but  he  cared  more  for  what  the  sword 
could  achieve  as  the  pioneer  of  statesmanship,  than  for 
all  other  reasons.  Filled  with  a  spirit  of  chivalry  and 
lofty  pride  in  his  ideal  of  manhood,  with  its  graces,  its 
accomplishments,  and  its  gallantry,  he  deemed  that  the 
complete  gendeman  should  be  a  complete  soldier. 

•  But  all  this  was  the  gloss  on  the  mere  surface  of  his 
nature  ;  below  all  these  shining  qualities  lay  the  depths 
of  a  broad  and  profound  statesmanship  ;  too  broad  and 
too  deep  to  be  comprehended  by  many  of  the  men 
around  him.  In  fact,  it  is  doubtful  whether  he  did  not 
make  a  mistake  in  withholding  from  his  friends  a  fuller 
explanation  of  his  designs.  He  left  them,  perhaps,  too 
much  shrouded  in  mystery — he  was  too  reticent.  He 
had  a  thorough  contempt  for  Spain,  Spanish  politics, 
and  Spanish  politicians  ;  and  he  had  unbounded  faith 
in  the  ability  of  a  few  leading  Americans,  if  guided  by 
wise  counsels,  to  advance  from  New  Orleans, — as  the 
base  of  operations, — into  Mexico  and  Central  America, 
and  ultimately  into  Cuba  and  the  circumjacent  islands, 
and  make  a  confederation  of  states  that,  if  carried  out. 
would  either  have  given  an  early  and  tremendous  impe- 
tus to  our  young  Republic,  or  else  have  reared  another 
friendly  state  engaged  in  the  same  great  business  of 
founding  free  institutions  on  a  broad  scale.  But  no- 
body who  knew  anything  on  the  subject,  ever  believed 
he  had  a  shadow  of  a  purpose  of  diverting  a  single 
state  from  its  allegiance.  At  most  he  would  only  have 
been  a  filibuster,  which  only  meant  a  prophet. 

1  The  whole  West  being  thrown  into  a  spasm  of  ter- 
ror lest  some  great  and  treasonable  scheme  for  divid- 
ing the  American  Union  should  be  carried  into  effect, 
on  the  25th  of  November,  1806,  Jefferson  issued  his  pro- 
clamation denouncing  the  alleged  enterprise,  and  warn- 
ing the  West  against  it.  Burr  was  indicted  and  brought 
to  trial  for  treason.  The  indictment  would  have  been 
sustained  had  there  been  any  grounds  for  it,  for  the 
prosecution  was  conducted  by  the  ablest  talent  of  the 
American  bar.  Henry  Clay  was  not  a  man  easily  de- 
ceived, and  that  a  single  unpatriotic  hair  ever  lay  over 
his  glorious  head  no  man  has  ever  been  base  enough  to 
assert.  He  was  a  man  of  honor  himself,  and  he  had 
absolute  faith  in  the  chivalric  honor  of  Aaron  Burr. 
Before  he  undertook  his  case,  he  asked  him,  in  confi- 
dence, to  make  to  him  a  statement  that  would  fully  jus- 
tify him  before  the  world,  in  reposing  in  him  that  con- 
fidence which  he  should  repose,  if  such  a  pledge  were 
made.  This  pledge  was  promptly  given  by  Burr,  in 
language  the  most  broad,  comprehensive,  and  particu- 
lar. "  He  had  no  design,"  he  said,  "  to  intermeddle 
7vith  or  disturb  the  tranquillity  oj theUnited States, 
nor  its  territories,  nor  any  part  of  them.  He  haa 
neither  issued,  nor  signed,  nor  promised,  a  com- 
mission to  any  person  for  any  purpose.  He  did 
not  own  a  single  musket,  nor  bayonet,  nor  any  single 
article  of  military  stores,  nor  did  any  other  person 
for  him,  by  his  authority  or  knowledge.    His  view* 


BURR  IN  HIS  HOME. 


461 


and  Trafalgar  had  already  been  proclaimed.  She  assumed  the  right  of  ex- 
cluding all  neutral  vessels  from  the  ports  of  France  ;  and  the  emperor  had 
published  his  decrees — retaliatory  decrees — of  the  same  character,  against 
Great  Britain.  Both  powers  were  guilty  of  the  grossest  violation  of  the  same 
recognized  principles  of  international  law.  Two  powerful  sovereigns  were 
fighting  against  each  other ;  but  they  had  no  right  to  interfere  with  neutral 
and  friendly  nations.  Both,  however,  seized,  and  condemned  as  prizes, 
every  American  vessel  they  could  capture,  that  did  not  respect  their  arbitrary 
and  unjust  orders  and  decrees.1     Jefferson  recommended  and  enforced  an 


had  been  explained  to  several  distinguished  mem- 
bers of  the  administration,  were  well  understood 
and  approved  by  the  government.  They  were  such 
as  every  man  of  honor  and  every  good  citizen  must 
approve.  He  considered  this  declaration  proper  as 
well  to  counteract  the  chimerical  tales  circulated 
by  the  malez'olence  of  his  enemies,  as  to  satisfy  Mr. 
Clay  that  he  did  not  become  the  counsel  of  a  man  in 
any  way  unfriendly  to  the  laws,  the  government,  or 
the  well-being  of  his  country." 

'Of  course  the  whole  thing  ended  in  smoke,  but 
leaving  an  additional  shadow  hanging  over  Burr,  who 
seemed  to  be  destined  to  find  no  escape  from  political 
persecution  until  he  found  peace  in  the  grave. 

1  As  for  myself,  I  have  always  regarded  it  as  one  of 
the  greatest  calamities  that  ever  happened  to  this  na- 
tion, that  Burr's  great  scheme  was  nipped  in  the  bud. 
It  may,  possibly,  not  have  been  as  well  for  us  in  the 
long  run,  to  have  had  the  Spanish  power  blotted  out  at 
so  early  a  period  along  our  border;  but  I  am  con- 
vinced that  it  delayed  for  a  long  time  the  emancipation 
of  the  Spanish  colonies,  and  postponed  indefinitely 
their  advance  to  civilization.' 

This  gentleman  from  whom  I  am  quoting  so  much 
in  extenso,  knew  all  about  the  domestic  relations  of 
Colonel  Burr,  and  the  private  affairs  of  his  household. 
He  said  that  he  had  never  known  nor  read  of  an  in- 
stance of  such  pride  and  affection  in  a  father,  as  he 
displayed  to  the  day  of  his  death  for  his  charming 
daughter  Theodocia.  In  tenderness  of  affection,  in 
the  assiduity  and  care  he  displayed  in  her  education, 
in  the  aspirations  he  breathed  into  her  beautiful  soul 
for  that  wonderful  intellectual  supremacy  which  she 
reached,  and  for  the  completeness  and  symmetry  with 
which  she  ripened  into  womanhood  ;  and  the  earnest, 
truthful,  and  almost  idolatrous  love  with  which  that 
daughter  returned  all  this  affection,  constituted,  he 
often  used  to  say,  the  most  beautiful  sight  he  ever  wit- 
nessed in  domestic  life.  '  No  man,'  he  once  exclaimed 
with  uncontrolled  enthusiasm,  '  could  pass  an  evening 
in  Burr's  house,  when  young  Theodocia,  scarcely  yet 
•ome  to  womanhood,  presided  over  its  hospitalities 
with  the  grace  of  a  queen,  and  witness  the  tenderness 
and  exquisite  beauty  of  those  relations  between  the 
father  and  child,  and  watch  the  appreciation  of  his 
great  qualities,  as  adoration  for  them  beamed  forth  from 
the  illuminated  face  of  Theodocia,  and  ever  after- 
wards doubt  that  there  was  a  fountain  of  parental  af- 
fection, and  manly  honor,  and  purity  in  his  great  soul, 
which  would  at  once  silence  all  the  clamor  that  was 
raised  against  his  personal  character.  Whatever  may 
be  the  views  people  now  take  of  those  matters,  society 


is  its  own  mistress — it  will  dictate  its  own  laws,  and 
prescribe  its  own  maxims  and  modes.  Certain  it  is 
that  in  those  days  gallantry,  while  not  classed  among 
the  necessary  virtues  of  society,  was  not  considered, 
as  it  now  is,  the  total  demoralizer  of  the  heart, 
the  debaucher  of  honor,  and  the  underminer  of  integ- 
rity. I  have  known  most  of  the  shining  men  and  wo- 
men of  the  early  times  of  our  country,  but  I  have  never 
known  a  man  whom  I  regarded  so  pre-eminendy  quali- 
fied to  bring  up  a  pure  and  brilliant  child  like  Theodo- 
cia ;  nor  in  the  highest  sense  in  which  the  word  honor 
is  known  among  men,  do  I  believe  that  any  man  of  his 
time  stood  higher  in  the  estimate  of  those  who  knew 
him  best,  than  Aaron  Burr.' 

1  To  the  embittering  grievance  of  impressment  was 
added  in  1806  and  1807,  a  series  of  paper  blockades,  by 
means  of  which,  not  only  American  seamen,  but  Amer- 
ican merchandise  afloat,  became  subject  to  seizure 
and  confiscation  upon  the  high  seas,  under  circum- 
stances which  left  the  American  government  no  choice 
but  to  abandon  the  ocean  entirely,  or  submit  to  a 
wholesale  plunder  upon  the  seas,  destructive  to  their 
prosperity,  and  intolerable  to  national  pride.  By  these 
Orders  in  Council  the  whole  French  empire,  with  its  al- 
lies and  dependencies,  then  embracing  nearly  all  of 
Europe,  were  declared  to  be  in  a  state  of  blockade. 
Any  American  vessel  bound  to  or  returning  from  any 
port  in  any  of  these  countries,  without  first  stopping  at 
an  English  port  and  obtaining  a  license  to  prosecute  the 
voyage,  was  declared  a  lawful  prize.  This  was  in  re- 
taliation of  Napoleon's  Berlin  and  Milan  decrees, 
wherein  he  had  declared  the  British  islands,  their  de- 
pendencies and  allies  in  a  state  of  blockade,  and  had 
rendered  every  vessel  liable  to  confiscation,  which 
either  touched  at  a  British  port,  or  was  laden,  in 
whole  or  in  part,  with  British  produce.  This  decree, 
however,  was  in  retaliation  of  a  previous  decree,  passed 
by  the  English  government  in  1806,  whereby  the  whole 
imperial  coast,  from  Brest  to  the  Elbe,  was  declared  in 
a  state  of  blockade. 

All  these  decrees  were  haughty  and  high-handed 
violations  of  national  law,  which  allows  of  no  mere 
paper  blockades,  and  requires  the  presence  of  a  suffi- 
cient force  to  render  them  legal.  Between  these 
haughty  belligerents,  no  American  vessel  could  be  free 
from  liability  to  confiscation.  If  they  were  bound  on  a 
voyage  to  any  European  port,  they  must  touch  at  an 
English  port  and  obtain  a  license,  or  become  a  lawful 
prize  to  some  one  of  the  thousand  British  cruisers  which 
vexed  the  ocean.  If  fhey  touched  at  an  English  port, 
or  were  laden,  in  whole  or  in  part,  with  British  mer- 
chandise, they  were  confiscated  by  the  imperial  edicts 
as  soon  as  they  reached  a  continental  port.  Both  de- 
crees were  equally  hostile  to  American  commerce  :  but 
the  English  had  set  the  first  example,  and  the  practical 
operations  of  their  Orders  in  Council  was  far  inor* 
destructive  than  Napoleon's  decree.  One  thousand 
American  vessels,  richly  laden,  became  the  prize  of  the 
British  cruisers  ;  irritating  cases  of  impressment  were 
constandy  occurring  ;  the  language  of  American  di- 
plomacy became  daily  more  angry  and  impatierrt,  that 
of  England  daily  more  cold  and  haughty,  and  in  June, 
1812,  the  Ameiican  Congress  declared  war. — Collins* 
History  of  Kentucky,  vol.  L  pp.  296,  29.7. 


462  MADISON  ELECTED  JEFFERSON'S  SUCCESSOR. 

embargo,  which  Congress  enacted.  The  question  was  ultimately  adjusted  witli 
France  without  much  difficulty ;  but  there  were  more  deeply-seated  causes  for 
complaint  against  Great  Britain.  Here  we  encounter  again  the  question  of 
the  Right  of  Search.1  Instances  were  constantly  occurring,  in  which  our  un- 
protected merchant  vessels  were  overhauled  and  searched,  and  numbers  of 
their  crews  seized  and  carried  on  board  the  armed  ships  of  Great  Britain. 
Things  went  on  so  far  that  the  American  ship-of-war  Chesapeake  was  at- 
tacked by  the  British  vessel  Leopard,  and  four  men  were  taken  from  her  crew. 
This  outrage  inflamed  feelings  which  finally  found  vent  only  in  the  war  which 
occurred  five  years  afterwards. 

Madison  Elected  Jefferson' s  Successor. — Another  presidential  election 
was  drawing  near ;  and  Jefferson,  who  had  served  eight  years,  was  regarded 
as  out  of  the  question.  Washington's  example  had  established  a  precedent; 
and  had  he  not,  Jefferson  was  known  to  look  unfavorably  even  upon  a  second 
term,  while  a  third  term  nowhere  found  an  advocate.  Mr.  Madison, 
1809,  one  of  the  illustrious  men  of  the  times,  and  the  one  to  whom  we 
are  perhaps  more  indebted  than  to  any  other  for  his  great  agency  in  fram- 
ing the  Constitution,  was  chosen  to  succeed  Jefferson,  while  George  Clin- 
ton, of  New  York,  was  re-elected  Vice-President.  One  of  the  early  acts 
of  the  Madison  administration  was  to  repeal  the  embargo  which  had  been 
laid  by  Congress  during  Jefferson's  term.  It  was  regarded,  and  justly  too, 
as  unnecessarily  severe — embarrassing  friends  as  well  as  foes.  A  wiser 
measure  was  proposed  as  a  substitute.  In  repealing  the  Embargo  Act,  a  law 
was  enacted  prohibiting  all  intercourse  with  Great  Britain  and  France  ;  with  a 
provision  that  this  system  of  non-intercourse  should  cease  in  respect  to  either 
of  those  nations,  when  they  should  annul  their  odious  and  unjust  decrees. 
This  course  seemed,  for  the  time,  to  be  effectual  on  England ;  for  in  April, 
1809,  assurances  were  given  by  Lord  Erskine  to  the  American  Secretary 
of  State,  pledging  the  repeal  of  all  British  Orders  in  Council  affecting  the 
United  States.  In  the  meantime  the  British  ministry  had  changed  their 
policy  with  their  varying  fortunes  in  the  European  struggle  with  Napoleon. 
That  ministry  alleged  that  Erskine  had  exceeded  his  powers,  and  he  was 
recalled.  His  successor — a  Mr.  Jackson— imprudently  accused  the  Secretary 
of  State  of  being  cognizant  to  the  alleged  fact.     It  was  honorably  and  frankly 

1  Being  the  second  maritime  power  in  the  world,  the  seized  at  the  discretion  of  any  British  officer,  and 
United  States  became  the  carrier  on  the  ocean  of  a  forced,  under  the  discipline  of  the  lash,  to  waste  their 
large  portion  of  the  commerce  of  Europe.  ManyEng-  lives  in  the  most  unhealthy  climates,  and  in  the  most 
fkh  seamen,  tempted  by  the  high  wages  given  by  degraded  stations.  This  grievance  was  the  subject  of 
American  merchants,  were  employed  in  our  commercial  protracted  and  bitter  remonstrance,  from  the  adminis- 
munne  ;  and  England  claimed  and  exercised  the  right  tration  of  Washington  to  the  opening  of  the  war  ;  but 
of  impressing  her  own  seamen  wherever  they  might  be  Great  Britain  constantly  refused  to  abandon  the  right, 
found.  The  enormous  navy  which  she >naintained  re-  or  rather  the  exercise  of  the  power.  In  truth,  her  ex- 
quired  to  be  supported  by  constant  impressment ;  and  traordinary  efforts  by  land  and  sea  called  for  all  the 
under  color  of  seizing  her  own  citizens,  she  was  con-  resources  of  men  and  money  which  could  be  made 
stantly  in  the  habit  of  stopping  American  merchant-  available  in  any  part  of  the  world;  and  the  sixty 
men,  and  selecting  from  the  crew  such  men  as  her  thousand  splendid  and  unequalled  seamen,  which 
subordinate  officers  chose  to  consider  English,  Irish,  or  manned  the  American  marine,  totally  unprotected,  save 
Scotch,  and  who  were  frequently  native  American  by  diplomatic  remonstrances,  afforded  too  rich  a  re- 
citizens.  Redress  could  seldom  be  obtained,  and  source  to  be  abandoned. — Collins'  History  0/  Ken- 
never,  except  after  interminable  delay  and  vexation,  titcky,  vol.  i.  p.  296. 
All  Americans  upon  the  ocean  thus  became  liable  to  be 


FRESH  AGGRESSIONS  OF  GREAT  BRITAIN.  463 

disclaimed;   but  Mr.  Jackson  repeated  his  accusation,   when   the  President 
very  properly  declined  any  further  intercourse  with  the  gentleman. 

In  1 8 10,  Napoleon  repealed  his  decrees  that  had  so  seriously  embarrassed 
our  commerce ;  and  on  the  2d  of  November  following,  Mr.  Madison  pub- 
lished a  proclamation  which  opened  all  our  relations  of  commerce  and 
amity  with  the  French  empire. 

Aggressions  of  Great  Britain. — England  seemed  indisposed  to  cultivate 
peaceful  relations  with  this  country,  and  international  animosities  went  so  far 
that  the  Little  Belt,  a  British  war  vessel,  under  Captain  Bingham,  attacked— 
May  16th,  181 1 — the  American  frigate  President,  off  Cape  Charles.  The 
insult  was  repelled,  and  the  British  flag  was  lowered  in  surrender.  Still  more 
violent  animosities  were  inflamed  on  both  sides  by  this  encounter ;  and  it  is 
now  placed  beyond  the  reach  of  cavil  or  dispute,  that  the  British  ministry 
entertained,  at  that  time,  not  only  a  desire,  but  a  determination  to  have  one 
more  struggle  with  this  country,  under  the  shallow  belief  that  these  States 
might  be  reduced  to  their  ancient  subjection  to  the  British  Crown ;  or,  at 
all  events,  that  a  rival  commercial  power  growing  up  in  the  trans-Atlantic 
world  could  be  effectually  humbled. 

The  first  unmistakable  sign  of  British  feeling  on  this  subject,  was  mani- 
fested by  a  hostile  confederation  that  had,  through  English  connivance,  been 
formed  by  the  Indian  tribes  on  our  western  frontier.  This  confederacy  was 
headed  by  Tecumseh,  an  Indian  chief  of  great  ability  and  influence,  who  flew 
from  tribe  to  tribe  to  inflame  .the  most  deadly  passions  of  the  Indian  races 
against  the  United  States.  King  Philip  had,  in  undertaking  his  wars, 
believed  it  possible  to  exterminate  the  pale-faces  from  the  North  American 
continent.  Tecumseh  only  hoped  to  reduce  them  within  the  limits  of  that 
narrow  belt,  which,  before  his  time,  had  restricted  the  advances  of  the  British 
colonies. 

The  command  of  this  new  war  of  defence  against  Indian  atrocities  was 
committed  to  Governor  Harrison,  of  the  Territory  of  Indiana,  and  who  was 
subsequently  elected  President.  He  soon  turned  it  into  a  war  of  aggression 
and  conquest.  On  the  7th  of  November,  181 1,  after  an  agreement  with  the 
messengers  of  Tecumseh  to  suspend  hostilities  till  the  following  day,  the  war- 
whoop  rang  through  his  camp  that  night.  But  the  savages  were  repulsed 
with  a  bloody  slaughter. 

Hostilities  with  Great  Britain  inevitable. — Events  were  now  fast  hurrying 
onwards  to  a  hostile  issue  with  Great  Britain.  During  eight  years,  her  depre- 
dations upon  our  commerce  had  extended  so  far  that  nine  hundred  laden 
American  vessels  had  been  taken  as  British  prizes.  The  President  and  his 
constitutional  advisers  saw  that  some  vigorous  steps  must  be  taken.  Con- 
gress felt  the  same  necessity,  and  the  people  of  the  country  were  clamorous 
for  decided  action.     Statutes  were  immediately  enacted  to  enlarge  the  navy, 


464  THE  SECOND  WAR  WITH  ENGLAND. 

and  increase  the  army  to  thirty-five  thousand  men.  The  duties  upon  foreigr. 
importations  were  doubled,  and  the  President  was  empowered  to  borrow 
eleven  million  dollars  to  carry  on  a  new  war  with  the  empire  that  had 
attempted  to  render  our  independence  impossible,  and  that  now  wished  to 
strangle  us  in  our  infancy.  A  deep  sensation  was  made  by  some  document- 
ary proofs  laid  before  Congress  by  Mr.  Madison,  which  showed  that,  in  1809, 
the  Governor  of  Canada  had  sent  an  emissary  into  this  country,  with  money 
and  instructions  to  break  up  the  National  Union.  The  chief  scope  of  his 
mission  consisted  in  the  attempt  to  draw  off  New  England,  with  one  or  more 
of  the  Northern  States,  into  a  confederation  which  should  be  under  the  special 
protection  of  Great  Britain,  and,  in  fact,  become  one  of  her  dependencies. 
The  scene  of  his  efforts  was  limited  to  this  district,  and  to  the  Federalists  as 
a  party — for,  from  the  foundation  of  the  government,  the  Republican  or 
Democratic  party  has  never  entertained  any  cordial  feelings  towards  our 
ancient  oppressor.  This  emissary  of  the  British  government  was  a  certain 
Mr.  John  Henry.  He  did  his  best ;  but  the  humiliating  failure  he  expe- 
rienced, furnishes  only  another  illustration  of  the  profound  ignorance  of  the 
character  and  spirit  of  the  American  people,  which  has  always  distinguished 
the  British  Cabinet. 


SECTION  ELEVENTH. 


THE    SECOND    WAR  WITH    ENGLAND. 

Causes  which  led  to  our  Second  War  for  Independence. — Nearly  thirty  years 
had  now  elapsed  since  the  close  of  the  American  Revolution.  With  the  ex- 
ception of  our  border  wars,  and  some  slight  collisions  of  no  great  importance 
with  France  and  England,  and  brief  hostilities  carried  on  against  Tripoli,  the 
Republic  had  been  at  peace  with  all  nations,  and,  outside  of  England,  we  had 
not  an  enemy  in  the  civilized  world.  Another  generation  had  come  upon  the 
scene.  Some  of  the  veterans  of  the  Revolution  were  left ;  and  they  were 
ready  enough  to  gird  on  the  sword.  They  were  also  competent  to  the  busi- 
ness of  leading  armies.  But  the  military  ardor  of  the  country  had  cooled, 
and  habits  of  war  were  no  longer  familiar  to  the  American  people. 

But  events  had  occurred,  and  public  feeling  had  been  excited  to  such  a 
point,  that  a  Second  War  with  England  had  become  inevitable.  That 
haughty  power  abated  few  of  her  pretensions,  and  America  was  determined  to 
abate  them.  On  the  18th  of  June,  18 12,  a  Proclamation  of  War  against 
Great  Britain  was  passed  by  a  large  majority  in  Congress.  The  nation  was 
unprepared  for  the  enterprise ;  but  there  was  a  spirit  of  confidence,  daring, 
and  independence  in  the  hearts  of  our  people,  which  would  submit  to  dicta- 
tion, aggression,  and  depredation  no  longer.  The  country  felt  that  a  Second 
War  was  as  necessary  to  complete  our  Independence,  as  the  first  had  been 
to  defend  its  Declaration. 


HOSTILITIES  ON  LAND  AND  SEA.  465 

Hull's  cowardly  Surrender. — Gen.  Dearborn,  who  had  gone  through  the 
Revolution,  was  chosen  major-general  and  commander-in-chief  of  the  army. 
It  was  decided  at  Washington  to  begin  hostilities  by  invading  Canada. 
Three  regiments  of  volunteers,  with  three  hundred  regular  troops,  all  under 
the  command  of  Gen.  Hull,  gathered  on  the  frontier,  and  the  invasion  took 
place  on  the  12th  of  July.  A  more  unfortunate  choice  could  not  have  been 
made  in  the  appointment  of  the  commander  of  this  expedition  ;  for  Gen.  Hull 
was  destitute  of  every  gre-t  military  quality.  He  was  timid  by  nature,  and 
he  covered  our  arms  with  dishonor.  Meeting  the  enemy  with  a  fair  chance 
of  a  general  and  decisive  engagement,  his  army  drawn  up,  and  his  men 
impatient  for  battle,  he  gave  orders  for  a  retreat.  The  indignation  of  the 
army  knew  no  bounds.  They  threw  their  arms  on  the  ground,  and  strong 
and  brave  men  wept  like  women,  at  their  humiliation  j  ■  while  women,'  as 
Mrs.  Willard  nobly  says,  '  were  angry  at  such  apparent  cowardice.'  Impa- 
tient, to  all  appearance,  to  consummate  his  disgrace,  he  hung  out  a  white  flag 
from  the  walls  of  his  fort,  and,  without  consulting  his  officers,  and  by  no 
means  disabled  or  reduced  to  the  necessity  of  yielding,  and  with  a  fair  pros- 
pect of  a  glorious  campaign  before  him,  he  precipitately  and  unqualifiedly 
surrendered.  He  was  subsequently  exchanged,  tried  by  a  court-martial  of  Ms 
countrymen,  and  sentenced  to  death.  Contrary  to  the  public  wish,  and  in 
defiance  of  the  public  judgment,  he  was  pardoned  by  the  President. 

American  Naval  Victories. — But  this  foul  disgrace  was  somewhat  oblite- 
rated by  naval  successes  which  soon  followed.  Only  three  days  after  Hull's 
surrender  of  Detroit,  Capt.  Hull,  in  command  of  the  American  frigate  Con- 
stitution, fell  in  with  the  British  frigate  Guerriere,  commanded  by  Capt. 
Dacres,  and  as  the  British  commander  had  challenged  any  vessel  in  the  Ameri- 
can navy  of  his  own  class,  and  professed  especial  contempt  for  the  Yankees, 
Hull  determined  to  chastise  him  on  the  first  opportunity.  When  they  came 
in  sight  of  each  other,  Hull  cleared  his  decks  for  action.  The  engagement 
began,  and  in  thirty  minutes  the  Guerriere  struck  her  colors.  A  few  days 
later,  Capt.  Porter,  of  the  Essex,  overhauled  another  British  armed  vessel,  the 
Alert.     She  struck  her  flag  in  eight  minutes. 

General  Harrison  Commands  the  Western  Troops. — The  disgraceful  con- 
duct of  General  Hull  aroused  a  feeling  of  indignation  in  the  West,  which 
made  every  man's  cheek  burn  with  shame ;  and  in  a  few  days  ten  thousand 
men  had  sprung  to  arms,  and,  marching  to  the  frontier,  clamored  for  a  sight 
of  the  foe.  Gen.  Harrison  was  put  at  the  head  of  those  forces,  and  the 
British  found  in  him  a  different  man  to  deal  with. 

In  command  of  the  little  sloop-of-war,  the  Wasp,  Capt.  Jones— Oct.  18th — 
fell  in  with  the  Frolic,  which  he  captured  after  a  desperate  fight,  in  which  five- 
sixths  of  the  British  crew  fell.  Flushed  with  victory,  Jones  saw  a  British  line* 
of-battle  ship,  mounting  seventy-four  guns,  bearing  down  upon  him.  The 
Wasp  was  in  too  shattered  a  condition  to  hope  to  escape ;  and  Jones,  with 
his  prize,  fell  into  the  enemy's  hands. 
3o 


466  RE-ELECTION  OF  MADISON. 

On  the  25th  of  the  same  month,  Commodore  Decatur,  on  the  frigate 
United  States,  covered  himself  with  glory  by  the  capture  of  the  frigate  Mace- 
donian. On  the  28th  of  December  following,  Commodore  Bainbridge  took 
the  British  frigate  Java,  off  the  coast  of  Brazil.  In  the  meantime,  our  priva- 
teers were  sweeping  the  ocean ;  they  had  already  taken  two  hundred  and  fifty 
British  vessels,  and  brought  home  upwards  of  three  thousand  prisoners. 

•  Re-Election  of  Madison. — Mr.  Madison  was  re-elected,  and  inaugurated  on 
the  4th  of  March,  181 3,  when  Elbridge  Gerry  became  Vice-President.  The 
Federal  party  had  now  grown  into  general  disfavor,  and  the  Republicans — who 
should  hereafter  be  called  the  Democrats — had  everything  their  own  way. 
The  Federalists,  as  a  party,  had  opposed  the  war,  which  robbed  them  of  most 
of  their  influence.  The  United  States  have  prosecuted  but  a  few  wars ;  they 
have,  however,  all  been  popular  with  the  people,  as  wars  almost  invariably 
are  when  carried  on  by  Republics.  Those  public  men  who  opposed  the 
Second  War  with  England,  never  became  the  favorites  of  the  masses ;  and 
the  term  Federalist,  when  applied  to  a  statesman  in  after  times,  inflamed 
against  him  the  most  unconquerable  odium. 

Rep etition  of  former  British  Atrocities. — It  is  with  regret  that  we  are 
obliged,  in  this  war,  as  we  did  in  that  of  the  Revolution,  to  recount  so  many 
instances  of  violation  of  faith,  and  such  frequent  resorts  to  atrocities  and 
massacres.  The  English  employed  and  paid  the  Indian  savages  for  perpetrat- 
ing these  shocking  barbarities.  During  the  engagement  of  a  detachment  of 
the  American  army,  under  General  Winchester,  with  the  main  body  of  the 
British  army,  under  Col.  Proctor,  the  American  commander  was  taken;  but 
his  soldiers  were  doing  their  duty  on  the  field,  and  had  a  fair  chance  of  win- 
ning the  battle.  Partly  terrified  by  a  threat  of  Col.  Proctor,  of  letting  loose 
the  savages  for  another  general  massacre  of  our  helpless  frontier  population, 
and  influenced  partly  by  the  promise  that  Proctor  had  made,  that  if  the 
Americans  would  surrender,  the  frontier  population'  should  be  protected, 
they  laid  down  their  arms  as  soon  as  they  received  this  assurance,  with  the 
order  of  their  captive  commander,  to  surrender.  The  dastard  liar,  who  pro- 
fessed to  represent  the  chivalry  and  honor  of  England,  turned  them  out  for 
butchery,  unarmed.  The  war-whoop  rang  on  the  night  air,  and  five  hundred 
Americans  were  brained  by  the  tomahawk.  Most  of  them  were  young  men 
from  the  best  families  in  Kentucky.  That  foul  treachery  has  neither  been 
forgotten  nor  forgiven,  and  it  never  will  be  by  Western  men. 

Heroism  of  Major  Croghan. — Gen.  Harrison  had  removed  his  army  to 
Fort  Meigs,  where  he  was  besieged  by  Proctor ;  but  the  Englishman  was  ob- 
liged to  raise  the  siege,  and  was  defeated  in  a  fiercely  contested  battle.  He 
then,  ivith  a  superior  force,  attacked  Fort  Stevenson,  on  the  Sandusky  river. 
That  little  fortification  was  held  by  the  brave  Major  Croghan,  an  almost 
•beardless  boy,  and  one  hundred  and  sixty  heroic  soldiers.    Proctor  was  forced 


PERRY'S  VICTORY  ON  LAKE  ERIE.  467 

to  draw  off,  leaving  more  dead  men  on  the  ground  than  Crogan  had  men  when 
the  battle  began. 

Commodore  Chauncey's  Gallant  Conduct. — Commodore  Chauncey  had  has- 
tily made  ready  a  flotilla  on  Lake  Ontario,  with  which  he  transported  Gen. 
Dearborn's  army  to  York,  the  capital  of  Upper  Canada.  They  took  the 
town,  killed  ninety  of  the  British  troops,  wounded  two  hundred,  and  took 
eight  hundred  prisoners.  On  the  27th  of  May.  Gen.  Dearborn  attacked  Fort 
George.  Col.  St.  Vincent,  the  British  commander,  was  obliged  to  give  way, 
and,  spiking  his  guns,  abandoned  the  fort.  Something  had  been  done  to  atone 
for  Hull's  disgrace. 

Commodore  Perry  on  Lake  Erie. — In  the  meantime  Commodore  Perry 
had  a  little  fleet  under  his  command  on  Lake  Erie — consisting  of  the  Law- 
rence and  Niagara^  each  mounting  twenty-five  guns,  and  several  smaller  ves- 
sels carrying  two  apiece.  The  veteran  Commodore  Barclay,  with  about  the 
same  number  of  vessels,  guns,  and  men,  was  on  the  same  waters,  and  the 
country  was  waiting  to  hear  of  an  engagement. 

At  noon,  September  10th,  18 13,  Perry  began  the  fight.  Early  in  the  en- 
gagement his  flag-ship  was  disabled,  and  the  British  thought  they  had  won 
the  day.  But  at  this  moment,  Perry,  who  had  no  such  idea,  seized  his  flag, 
and  sprang  into  an  open  boat ;  and  while  a  shower  of  bullets  rained  all  around 
him,  he  pulled  for  his  next  best  ship,  leaped  upon  her  deck,  ran  up  his  ensign, 
gave  his  signals,  and  bore  down  upon  the  foe.  The  battle  lasted  four  hours, 
and  the  decks  of  all  the  vessels  were  covered  with  blood.  Perry's  men  fought 
not  only  with  the  courage  which  manliness  and  patriotism  inspire,  but  with 
the  desperation  he  had  kindled  in  their  breasts  by  shouting  to  them  during 
the  battle,  '  Now,  boys,  wipe  out  the  disgrace  of  Hull's  surrender.'  At  four 
o'clock  the  British  commander  struck  his  riddled  ensigns,  and  the  whole 
squadron  surrendered.1 

1  'The  action  began  between  eleven    and   twelve  ed  swiftly  down  the  line,  ordering  them  to  cease  firing, 

o'clock,  with  scarcely  a  breath  of  air  to  stir  the  bosom  and,  by  the  combined  use  of  their  sweeps  and  sails,  to 

of  the  lake.     Perry,  in  the  Lawrence,  accompanied  by  press  forward  into  close  action. 

two  of  the  small  vessels,  bore  down  upon  the  enemy,  '  Instantly  a  new  impulse  was  given-  to  the  whole 
but  was  not  closely  followed  by  Lieutenant  Elliot,  in  line.  The  well-known  signal  for  close  action  was  now 
the  Niagara,  and  the  rest  of  the  small  vessels.  For  two  seen  flying  from  the  Niagara,  and  after  a  delay  of  fif- 
hours  Perry  remained  exposed  to  the  fire  of  the  whole  teen  minutes,  to  enable  the  gun-boats  to  come  up,  Perry 
British  fleet,  by  which  his  vessel  was  cut  to  pieces,  and  bore  down  upon  the  British  line,  passed  through  it,  and 
three-fourths  of  his  crew  killed  and  wounded.  Elliot,  delivered  a  raking  fire  of  grape  and  canister,  from 
during  this  time  was  never  within  less  than  half  a  mile  both  broadsides,  at  half  pistol-shot  distance.  The. 
of  the  enemy,  and  the  residue  of  the  fleet  was  not  dreadful  cries  from  the  Queen  Charlotte  and  Lady- 
nearer  than  a  mile  and  a  half,  save  the  two  small  ves-  Prevost,  which  followed  this  close  and  murderous  dis- 
sels  which  accompanied  him.  By  two  o'clock  Perry's  charge,  announced  the  fatal  accuracy  with  which  it  had 
vessel  was  totally  disabled,  but  the  rest  of  his  fleet  was  been  delivered.  The  gun-boats  were  now  within  pistol- 
but  little  injured.  The  lake  was  so  smooth,  that  the  shot,  and  a  tremendous  cannonade,  accompanied  by 
distant  gun-boats,  from  their  long  twenty-four  and  the  shrill  clear  notes  of  many  bugles  from  the  English 
thirty-two  pounders,  threw  their  shot  with  great  preci-  vessels,  announced  that  they  expected  to  be  boarded, 
sion,  and  made  themselves  felt  in  the  action,  but  Elliot's  and  were  summoning  their  boarders  to  repel  the  antici- 
brig,  which  formed  so  essential  a  part  of  the  force,  and  pated  assault.  No  boarding,  however,  was  attempted, 
which  was  armed  almost  exclusively  with  carronades,  The  superior  weight  of  the  American  mettle  was  now 
had  as  yet  annoyed  the  enemy  but  little,  and  had  fought  telling,  in  close  fight,  when  the  full  power  of  their  ear- 
principally  with  two  twelve-pounders,  the  only  long  guns  ronades  was  felt,  and  in  fifteen  minutes  the  enemy  sur- 
she  had.  At  two  o'clock,  Perry  left  the  Lawrence  un-  rendered,  with  the  exception  of  two  of  their  smallest  ves- 
der  command  of  her  lieutenant,  and  in  an  open  boat,  sels,  which  attempted  to  escape.  The  attempt  proved 
rowed  to  the  Niagara.  Upon  Perry's  expressing  fruitless,  and  the  whole  fleet  of  the  enemy  became  the 
dissatisfaction  at  the  manner  in  which  the  gun-boats  prize  of  the  captors.  When  the  smoke  cleared  away, 
vere  managed,  Elliot  volunteered  to  bring  them  up.  so  that  the  hostile  fleets  could  be  distinctly  seen,  they 
He  left  the  Niagara  in  a  boat  for  that  purpose,  and  pass-  were  found  intermingled,  within  half  pistol-shot.    Th« 


468  DON'T  GIVE  UP  THE  SHIP. 

Tecufnseh  overtfrown. — This  brilliant  action  filled  the  country  with  en- 
thusiasm, and  covered  Perry  with  unfading  laurels.  A  passage  was  thus 
opened  to  the  territory  which  Hull  had  abandoned,  and  Gen.  Harrison  pressed 
on  to  occupy  it.  The  British  army  retreated  before  him,  and  the  Americans 
entered  Detroit.  On  the  5th  of  October,  a  battle  took  place  between  the 
two  commanders-in-chief  of  the  hostile  armies,  with  all  their  forces.  Nearly 
one-half  of  the  British  side  were  Indians,  and  the  Americans  had  long  known 
what  that  word  meant.  The  English  had  the  advantage  in  the  ground  ;  but 
Harrison's  evolutions  were  so  skilful,  and  his  men  fought  so  true  and  so 
brave  that  victory  began  to  light  upon  their  banners.  The  fortunes  of  the 
day  were  decided  by  the  charge  of  Col.  Johnson,  at  the  head  of  his  mounted 
Kentucky  riflemen.  Harrison  knew  that  the  great  chief  Tecumseh,  who  had 
been  made  a  general  in  the  British  army,  and  who  had  killed  his  thousands 
of  men,  was  fighting  on  the  British  side,  with  a  desperation  that  admitted  no 
thought,  either  of  losing  a  victory,  or  falling  into  the  hands  of  the  Americans. 
As  the  battle  rolled  on,  Johnson  launched  his  corps  against  the  centre  of 
Tecumseh' s  murderous  band,  when  the  death-struggle  came.  At  last,  dash- 
ing through  friend  and  foe,  as  he  caught  sight  of  the  murderous  glare  of  Te- 
cumseh, Johnson  reached  him,  and  laid  him  dead  on  the  field.  The  last 
reliance  of  the  cowardly  Proctor  was  gone.  He  knew  that  his  men  were  no 
match  for  the  army  under  General  Harrison,  without  the  brutal  aid  of  the 
savages.  The  victory  was  decisive.  It  reflected  honor  upon  the  American 
arms,  and  our  frontiersmen  breathed  freer  in  their  log-cabins,  scattered  along 
for  a  thousand  miles,  when  they  heard  that  Tecumseh  was  dead.  This  battle 
is  known  as  the  Victory  of  the  Thames. 

The  alliance  of  the  various  western  tribes,  under  the  leadership  of  Te- 
cumseh, was  now  broken ;  and  the  rest  of  the  fighting  which  the  British  com- 
manders were  to  do  in  that  war  had  to  be  done  by  white  men. 

Barbarities  of  Admiral  Cockburn. — In  the  previous  spring,  Delaware 
and  Chesapeake  Bays  were  proclaimed,  by  the  British  government,  to  be  in 
a  state  of  blockade  ;  and  three  British  admirals  were  sent  over  with  fleets  to 
enforce  it.  Having  taken  possession  of  several  islands  in  the  Chesapeake, 
Admiral  Cockburn  disgraced  his  name  and  the  arms  of  his  country,  by  bar- 
barous and  brutal  pillages,  depradations,  murders,  and  scenes  of  blood,  which 
outstripped  even  the  worst  savage  deeds  we  have  recounted.  He  became 
ferocious,  murderous,  and  cruel,  just  in  proportion  as  he  could  be  with  im- 
punity. He  had  a  cowardly  and  bloody  nature ;  and  history  has  done  him 
justice. 

1  Don't  give  up  the  Ship' — Still  other  successes  crowned  our  arms  at  sea. 
On  the  23d  of  February,  Captain  Lawrence,  on  the  Hornet,  took  the  British 

signal  for  close  action  was  still  flying  from  the  mast-  was  nearly  equal.      The  American  loss  was  twenty* 

head  of  the  American  commodore,  and  the  small  ves-  seven  killed,  and  ninety-six    wounded,  considerably 

sels  were  still  sternly  wearing  their  answering  flag  of  more  than  half  of  which  was  sustained  by  the  crew  of 

intelligence  and  obedience.     The  loss  on  both  sides,  the  Lawrence.' — Collins'  History  of  Kentucky,  vol 

owing  to  the  dreadful  slaughter  on  board  the  Lawrence,  i.  pp.  306,  307. 


WELLINGTON'S  VETERANS  IN  THE  STRUGGLE.  469 

sloop-of-war  Peacock,  after  an  action  of  only  a  quarter  of  an  hour.  He  was 
then  promoted  to  the  command  of  the  frigate  Chesapeake,  which  lay  disabled 
in  Boston.  Her  incomplete  crew  were  almost  in  a  state  of  mutiny,  from  not 
having  received  their  pay  j  and  Captain  Brooke,  who  had  command  of  the 
fine  frigate  Shannon,  with  a  picked  complement  of  officers  and  men,  sent  an 
insulting  challenge  to  Lawrence,  which  he  ought  not  to  have  accepted  ;  for 
the  odds  were  too  great.  He  met  him,  however,  and  in  less  than  twenty 
minutes  from  the  time  the  first  gun  was  fired,  every  officer  and  half  the  men 
on  board  the  Chesapeake  were  either  killed  or  wounded.  The  brave  Law- 
rence fell  upon  his  own  deck  j  but  he  shouted  to  his  men  with  his  last  breath, 
1  Don't  give  up  the  ship.'  The  English  boarded  her,  and  overpowering  her 
few  remaining  combatants,  the  shattered  frigate  became  the  enemy's  prize. 
But  she  gave  no  token  of  surrender ;  her  crew  were  cut  to  pieces,  and  the 
English  commander  was  obliged  to  lower  the  American  standard  with  his 
own  hand. 

Commissioners  appointed  with  a  View  to  meet  expected  Proposals  for 
Peace. — At  different  times  during  this  Second  War  with  England,  various 
proposals  had  been  made  for  peace.  England  was  deriving  from  it  no  ad- 
vantage whatever;  while,  although  we  met  with  reverses,  and  the  govern- 
ment was  seriously  embarrassed  in  its  finances,  the  United  States  were  grow- 
ing stronger  every  hour  the  war  lasted,  and  officers  were  coming  forward  in  a 
school  of  discipline  and  valor,  to  lead  our  armies  in  after-days.  The  military 
fruits  of  that  war  were  not  fully  reaped  until  the  officers  who  were  trained  in 
it  came  to  lead  our  battalions  across  the  plains  of  Mexico. 

John  Quincy  Adams,  Albert  Gallatin,  and  James  A.  Bayard,  were  ap- 
pointed commissioners  of  the  United  States,  to  meet  British  commissioners  at 
the  city  of  Ghent.  They  sailed  for  their  destination  in  the  month  of  August, 
and  were  soon  followed  by  Henry  Clay  and  Jonathan  Russell,  who  were 
added  to  the  commission.  But  the  government  relaxed  none  of  its  exertions. 
An  extra  session  of  Congress  was  called,  and  with  a  bold  and  strong  hand 
they  laid  heavy  taxes  upon  the  people  to  raise  money  to  carry  on  the  war. 
Everybody  who  was  taxed  raised  a  clamor ;  but  the  men  they  had  sent  to 
represent  them  let  them  clamor  on.  That  Congress  of  18 13-14  was  one  of 
the  noblest  that  had  assembled  since  the  beginning  of  the  Revolution. 

Wellington 's  Veterans  embarked  for  Canada. — Neither  had  the  British 
government  relaxed  any  of  its  exertions,  and  it  was  now  better  prepared  than 
ever  to  prosecute  the  war.  The  great  Napoleon  had  fallen,  and  was  on  his 
way  to  Elba.  Embarrassed  with  a  veteran  army  of  fourteen  thousand  men, 
for  whom  she  had  no  other  work,  England  embarked  them  from  Bordeaux  for 
Canada.  They  had  followed  the  standard  of  Wellington  in  his  wonderful 
campaigns.  New  fleets  also  sailed  for  our  shores,  with  orders  to  lay  waste  the 
coast  from  Maine  to  Georgia. 

The  Campaign  of  18 14  Opens  on  the  Northern  Frontier. — The  campaigr 


*7° 


BURNING  OF  THE  AMERICAN  CAPITOL. 


of  1814  opened,  and  all  the  forces  at  the  disposal  of  the  government  were 
despatched  to  the  northern  frontier.  Here  Scott  won  his  imperishable  name. 
The  battles  of  Niagara,  Chippewa,  and  Lundy's  Lane  are  too  familiar  to  every 
American  ear  to  need  any  rehearsal.  In  nearly  all  the  skirmishes  and  battles 
of  that  brilliant  campaign,  the  Americans  fought  to  the  greatest  disadvantage, 
but  something  was  gained  by  skilful  generalship.  They  were  contending, 
too,  with  the  best  troops  of  the  British  empire— then  beyond  all  question 
the  finest  in  the  world. 

Admiral  Cockburn  had  arrived  in  the  Chesapeake  with  a  new  fleet,  which 
brought  a  large  land  force,  under  the  veteran  commander,  Gen.  Ross.  On 
the  19th  of  August,  he  landed  five  thousand  men  at  Benedict,  twenty-five 
miles  above  the  mouth  of  the  Patuxent,  and  commenced  his  march,  with  the 
intention  of  burning  down  the  United  States  Capitol.  At  eight  o'clock  on 
the  evening  of  the  third  day,  he  marched  into  Washington  with  five  thousand 
men,  and  began  his  Vandal  work.  The  Capitol  was  not  finished,  but  the 
British  commander  burned  it  to  the  ground— he  burned  its  extensive  and  val- 
uable library,  and  all  its  collections,  which  had  been  gathered  from  distant 
quarters  of  the  world,  for  the  promotion  of  the  arts  of  peace  and  the  progress 
of  letters— he  burned  the  public  offices  of  the  various  departments  of  the 
government— he  burned  the  President's  house,  and  drove  Mrs.  Madison,  the 
President's  wife,  away  from  her  dwelling.  Almost  in  the  presence  of  Mrs. 
Madison  herself  these  unnecessary,  unprovoked,  and  unjustifiable  outrages 
were  perpetrated.1     Private  dwellings  were  pillaged,  sacked,  and  burnt  to 


1  '  When  the  British  marched  slowly  into  the  wil- 
derness city,  by  the  lurid  light  that  shot  up  from  the 
blazing  Capitol,  the  population  had  dwindled  down  to  a 
few  stragglers,  and  the  slaves  of  the  absent  residents. 
The  houses,  scattered  over  a  large  space,  were  shut, 
and  no  sign  of  life  was  visible.  The  President  had 
crossed  the  Potomac  early  in  the  afternoon,  and  Mrs. 
Madison  had  followed  in  another  direction.  The  bay- 
onets of  the  British  guard  gleamed  as  they  filed  down 
the  avenue,  and  the  fulminations  from  the  navy-yard 
saluted  them  as  they  passed.  Nothing  but  the  prayers 
and  entreaties  of  the  ladies,  and  the  expostulations  of 
the  nearest  residents,  deterred  the  British  General 
Ross  from  blowing  up  the  Capitol ;  but  he  ordered  it 
to  be  fired  at  every  point,  and  many  houses  near  it 
were  consumed.  A  house  hard  by,  owned  by  General 
Washington,  was  destroyed,  which,  in  justice  to  hu- 
man nature  be  it  said,  the  General  regretted.  Not  so 
the  Admiral,  who  ordered  the  troops  to  fire  a  volley  in- 
to the  windows  of  the  Capitol,  and  then  entered  to  plun- 
der.' 

'I  have,  indeed,  to  this  hour'  (said  Mr.  Richard 
Rush,  in  1855),  'the  vivid  impression  upon  my  eye  of 
columns  of  flame  and  smoke  ascending  throughout  the 
night  of  the  24th  of  August  from  the  Capitol,  Presi- 
dent's house,  and  other  public  edifices  ;  as  the  whole 
were  on  fire,  some  burning  slowly,  others  with  bursts 
of  flame,  and  sparks  mounting  high  up  in  the  dark  hori- 
zon. This  never  can  be  forgotten  by  me,  as  I  accom- 
panied out  of  the  city,  on  that  memorable  night  in  18 14, 
President  Madison,  Mr.  Jones,  then  Secretary  of  the 
Navy,  General  Mason,  of  Anacostia  Island,  Mr.  Charles 
Carroll,  of  Bellevue,  and  Mr.  Tench  Ringgold.  If  at 
intervals  the  dismal  sight  was  lost  to  our  view,  we  got 
it  again  from  some  hill-top  or  eminence  where  we 
paused  to  look  at  it.' 

A  letter  written  by  Mrs.  Madison  to  her  sister  at 
Mount  Vernon,  gives  us  an  insight  into  her  feelings  : 
'Tuesday,  August  23d,  1814. 

*Dear  Sister  : — My  husband  left  me  yesterday 
norning  to  join  General  Winder.      He  inquired  anx- 


iously whether  I  had  courage  or  firmness  to  remain  in 
the  President's  house  until  his  return  on  the  morrow 
or  succeeding  day,  and  on  my  assurance  that  I  had  no 
fear  but  for  him  and  the  success  of  our  army,  he  left 
me,  beseeching  me  to  take  care  of  myself,  and  of  the 
Cabinet  papers,  public  and  private.  I  have  since  re- 
ceived two  despatches  from  him  written  with  a  pencil ; 
the  last  is  alarming,  because  he  desires  that  I  should  be 
ready  at  a  moment's  warning  to  enter  my  carriage  and 
leave  the  city  :  that  the  enemy  seemed  stronger  than 
had  been  reported,  and  that  it  might  happen  that  they 
would  reach  the  city  with  intention  to  destroy  it.  .  .  . 
I  am  accordingly  ready  ;  I  have  pressed  as  many  Cab- 
inet papers  into  trunks  as  to  fill  one  carriage  ;  our  pri- 
vate property  must  be  sacrificed,  as  it  is  impossible  to 
procure  wagons  for  its  transportation.  I  am  determin- 
ed not  to  go  myself,  until  I  see  Mr.  Madison  safe,  and 
he  can  accompany  me,  as  I  hear  much  hostility  towards 
him.  .  .  Disaffection  stalks  around  us.  .  .  My  friends 
and  acquaintances  are  all  gone,  even  Colonel  C,  with 
his  hundred  men,  who  were  stationed  as  a  guard  in 
this  enclosure.  .  .  French  John  (a  faithful  domestic) 
with  his  usual  activity  and  resolution,  offers  to  spike 
the  cannon  at  the  gate,  and  lay  a  train  of  powder  which 
would  blow  up  the  British  should  they  enter  the  house. 
To  the  last  proposition  I  positively  object,  without  be- 
ing able,  however,  to  make  him  understand  why  all  ad- 
vantages in  war  may  not  be  taken. 

'Wednesday  Morning,  Twelve  o'ci.ock. 

'  Since  sunrise  I  have  been  turning  my  spy -glass  in 
every  direction  and  watching  with  unwearied  anxiety, 
hoping  to  discover  the  approach  of  my  dear  husband 
and  his  friends  ;  but,  alas  !  I  can  descry  only  groups  of 
military,  wandering  in  all  directions,  as  if  there  was  a 
lack  of  arms,  or  of  spirits,  to  fight  for  their  own  firesides. 

'Three  o'clock.— -Will  you  believe  it,  my  sister, 
we  have  had  a  battle  or  skirmish  near  Bladensburg, 
and  I  am  still  here  within  sound  of  the  cannon  !  Mr. 
Madison  comes  not ;  may  God  protect  him  !  Two  mesj 
sengers  covered  with  dust  come  to  bid  me  fly  ;  but  I 
wait  for  him.  ...  At  this  late  hour  a  wagon  has  bee» 


MRS.  MADISON'S  HEROIC  CONDUCT. 


471 


ashes.  The  British  commander  then  hastened  on  to  Baltimore,  to  sack  and 
burn  that  city ;  but  he  was  repulsed  by  the  Maryland  militia,  under  Gen. 
Smith  j  and  killed  in  battle  before  he  laid  another  large  town  in  ruins.  To 
save  the  British  army,  its  commanding  general  ordered  a  retreat  to  the  British 
ships  lying  off  the  coast.1 


piocured  ;  I  have  had  it  filled  with  the  plate  and  most 
valuable  portable  articles  belcnging  to  the  house; 
whether  it  will  reach  its  destination,  the  Bank  of  Mary- 
land, or  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  British  soldiery, 
events  must  determine.  Our  kind  friend  Mr.  Carroll, 
has  come  to  hasten  my  departure,  and  is  in  a  very  bad 
humor  with  me  because  I  insist  on  waiting  until  the 
large  picture  of  General  Washington  is  secured,  and 
it  requires  to  be  unscrewed  from  the  wall.  This  pro- 
cess was  found  too  tedious  for  these  perilous  moments  ; 
I  have  ordered  the  frame  to  be  broken  and  the  canvas 
taken  out ;  it  is  done— and  the  precious  portrait  placed 
in  the  hands  of  two  gentlemen  of  New  York  for  safe 
keeping.  And  now,  my  dear  sister,  I  must  leave  this 
house,  or  the  retreating  army  will  make  me  a  prisoner 
in  it,  by  filling  up  the  road  I  am  directed  to  take. 
When  I  shall  again  write  to  you,  or  where  I  shall  be 
to-morrow,  I  cannot  tell.' 

On  the  removal  of  the  seat  of  government  to 
Washington,  in  1800,  a  magnificent  portrait  of  General 
Washington,  painted  by  Stewart  partly,  and  completed 
by  Winstanley,  to  whom  President  John  Adams'  son- 
in-law,  Colonel  Smith,  stood  for  the  unfinished  limbs 
and  body,  hung  in  the  state  dining-room.  Colonel  W. 
P.  Custis,  of  Arlington,  a  grandson  of  Mrs.  Washing- 
ton, called  at  the  Presidents  to  save  this  picture  of  his 
illustrious  grandfather,  in  whose  house  he  was  reared. 
Then,  as  now.  it  was  one  of  the  very  few  ornaments 
which  adorned  the  White  House,  and  at  the  risk  of 
capture  Mrs.  Madison  determined  to  save  it.  The 
servants  of  the  house  broke  with  an  axe  the  heavy  gilt 
frame  which  protected  the  inner  one  of  wood  upon 
which  the  canvas  was  stretched,  and  removed,  unin- 
jured, the  painting,  leaving  the  broken  fragments 
screwed  to  the  wall  which  had  held  distended  the 
valued  relic.  Mrs.  Madison  then  left  the  house,  and 
the  portrait  was  taken,  while  in  the  inner  frame,  by  Mr. 
Baker,  beyond  Georgetown,  and  placed  in  a  secure 
position. 

The  Presidential  household-god,  the  image  of  the 
Father  of  his  Country — by  whom  its  chief  city  was 
fixed  near  his  home,  and  by  whose  name  it  was  called 
— was  thus  snatched  from  the  clutch  or  torch  of  the 
barbarian  captors.  Half  a  century  later,  when  the 
White  House  was  undergoing  a  renovation,  this  por- 
trait was  sent,  with  many  others  subsequently  added 
to  this  solitary  collection,  to  be  cleaned  and  the  frame 
burnished.  The  artist  found,  on  examination,  that  the 
canvas  had  never  been  cut,  since  the  rusted  tacks, 
time-worn  frame,  and  the  size  compared  with  the 
oiiginal  picture,  was  the  most  conclusive  evidence  that 
Mrs.  Madison  did  not  cut  it  out  with  a  carving-knife, 
as  many  traditions  have  industriously  circulated. — 
The  Ladies  of  the  White  House,  by  Laura  Carter 
Halloway,  pp.  193-196.  United  States  Publishing 
Company,  New  York. 

1  It  was  during  this  attack  on  Baltimore  that  an  in- 
cident occurred  which  will  always  be  related  with  in- 
terest, since  it  gave  origin  to  the  Star-Spangled  Ban- 
ner, our  most  popular  national  lyric.  Mr.  Francis  S. 
Key,  of  Georgetown,  had,  with  another  gentleman, 
gone  with  a  flag  of  truce  to  attempt  the  release  of  a 
friend  on  board  the  British  fleet.  They  were  tempora- 
rily detained,  lest  they  should  disclose  the  intended  at- 
tack on  the  city.  From  one  of  the  vessels  of  the  Brit- 
sh  squadron  they  saw  the  bombardment  of  Fort 
McHenry.  During  the  whole  day  they  watched  the 
flag  over  the  fort  with  the  deepest  anxiety,  till  night 
*id  it  from  view.  The  bombardment  continued.  With 
the  earliest  daylight  they  were  again  on  deck,  straining 


their  eyes  through  the  dawn,  when,  to  their  unexpres- 
sible  joy,  they  saw  the  Star-Spangled  Banner  still  wav- 
ing over  the  ramparts.  Under  this  inspiration  that 
immortal  lyric  was  begun,  and  chiefly  written  before 
the  patriotic  author  was  allowed  to  leave  his  unwilling 
prison. 

The  Star-Spangled  Banner. 
O  !  say,  can  you  see,  by  the  dawn's  early  light, 
What  so  proudly  we  hailed  at  the    twilight's   last 
gleaming  ; 
Whose  broad    stripes   and   bright  stars,   through   the 
perilous  fight, 
O'er    the  ramparts   we  watched    were  so  gallantly 
streaming  ? 
And  the  rocket's  red  glare,  the  bombs  bursting  in  air, 
Gave  proof  through  the  night  that  our  flag  was  still 

there  ; 
O  !  say,  does  that  star-spangled  banner  yet  wave 
O'er  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave  ? 

On  the  shore,  dimly  seen    through  the  mists  of  the 
deep, 

Where    the    foe's   haughty   host   in   dread   silence 
reposes, 
What  is  that  which  the  breeze  o'er  the  towering  steep 

As  it  fitfully  blows,  half  conceals,  half  discloses  ? 
Now  it  catches  the  gleam  of  the  morning's  first  beam ; 
Its  full  glory,  reflected,  now  shines  on  the  stream  ; 
'Tis  the  star-spangled  banner,  O  !  long  may  it  wave 
O'er  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave. 

And  where  is  the  band  who  so  vauntingly  swore, 

'Mid  the  havoc  of  war  and  the  battle's  confusion, 
A  home  and  a  country  they'd  leave  us  no  more  ? 
Their  blood    hath    wash'd  out  their  foul  footsteps' 
pollution  ; 
No  refuge  could  save  the  hireling  and  slave 
From  the  terror  of  flight,  or  the  gloom  of  the  grave  ; 
And  the  star-spangled  banner  in  triumph  shall  wave 
O'er  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave. 

O  !  thus  be  it  ever,  when  freemen  shall  stand 

Between  their  loved  home  and  the  war's  desolation  , 
Bless'd   with    victory    and    peace,  may    the    heavers- 
rescued  land 
Praise  the  Power  that  hath  made  and  preserved  us  » 
nation. 
Then  conquer  we  must,  for  our  cause  it  is  just, 
And  this  be  our  motto,  "  In  God  is  our  trust," 
And  the  star-spangled  banner  in  triumph  shall  ware 
O'er  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave. 

During  this  present  year,  1874,  Mr.  James  Lick,  of 
San  Francisco,  who,  with  a  munificence  that  seems  ta 
correspond  with  the  grandeur  which  nature  hai 
breathed  over  her  mighty  scenes  on  the  Golden  Coast, 
among  other  lavish  provisions  for  science,  art,  and  so- 
ciety, has  given  $150,000  for  a  monument,  in  Sai 
Francisco,  to  the  author  of  The  Star-Spangled  Bam  ei 


472  MACDONOUGH'S  VICTORY  ON  LAKE  CHAMPLAIN. 

Popular  Feeling  awakened  by  these  Atrocities. — There  are  even  now  liv 
ing  many  who  remember  the  feeling  that  went  through  the  country  when  the 
news  of  these  barbarities  reached  the  people.  There  was  no  longer  any  op- 
position to  the  war,  on  the  part  even  of  the  Federalists  themselves.  Daniel 
Webster  had  already  given  to  it  all  the  weight  and  earnestness  of  his  nature — 
so  had  all  the  other  great  men  of  the  times.  With  such  a  feeling,  victory 
everywhere  might  be  expected.     And  victory  came. 

Invasion  of  Fourteen  Thousand  British  Troops  from  Canada. — Fresh  re- 
inforcements of  Wellington's  veteran  troops  landed  in  Canada,  and  joined  the 
army  of  Sir  George  Prevost,  who  now  led  fourteen  thousand  men.  He 
marched  to  Lake  Champlain,  where  he  issued  a  proclamation  that  his  arms 
would  be  directed  only  against  the  government  and  its  supporters ;  and  he 
promised  protection  and  immunity  to  everybody  else.  The  whole  mass  of 
people  burned  with  the  fiercest  indignation,  at  the  depth  and  effrontery  of  this 
insult.  An  English  nobleman,  at  the  head  of  an  all  but  invincible  army,  in- 
vading a  peaceful  district,  with  power  to  destroy  its  inhabitants  and  burn  their 
dwellings,  offered  only  the  bribe  of  exemption  from  slaughter,  as  a  reward  to 
a  vast  community  for  turning  traitors  to  their  country.  All  party  distinctions 
and  local  differences  were  forgotten, — the  patriotic  fire  and  indignation  of  the 
people  broke  forth  ;  and  all  passions,  and  all  feelings,  drifted  into  a  blended 
current  of  indignation.  Men  came  rushing  in  from  every  quarter.  In  the 
northern  part  of  New  York,  the  dauntless  Green  Mountain  boys  crossed  the 
barrier  that  divided  their  homes  from  the  invader,  impatient  for  the  hour  of 
struggle.  Commodore  Dwinie  was  co-operating  with  the  British  commander, 
and  he  had  under  his  command,  on  Lake  Champlain,  a  squadron  mounting 
ninety-five  guns,  with  a  thousand  men.  Commodore  MacDonough  had  also  a 
naval  force  of  eighty-six  guns,  and  eight  hundred  men ;  and  he  was  preparing 
to  meet  him. 

Commodore  Mac Donougli s  Victory  on  Lake  Champlain. — At  nine  o'clock, 
September  nth,  1814,  the  British  Commodore,  who  had  chosen  his  position, 
commenced  the  attack.  The  shores  of  the  lake  were  dotted  for  miles  with 
anxious  groups  of  Americans,  who  had  flocked  to  witness  the  fortunes  of  the 
day,  and  either  see  with  their  own  eyes,  the  defeat  of  the  foe,  or  go  to 
their  homes  and  prepare  for  scenes  of  desolation.  Sir  George  Prevost,  with 
his  trained  battalions,  was  posted  in  a  convenient  place,  to  strike  the  final 
blow,  when  Commodore  MacDonough  should  strike  his  colors.  It  was  an 
arduous,  a  grand,  and  a  glorious  struggle.  There  are  oceans  that  belt  the 
globe,  that  never  sustained  braver  men,  or  drank  up  braver  blood  ;  and  so 
the  battle  went  on,  shaking  the  hills  that  begirt  that  beautiful  lake,  which 
nature  has  made  one  of  the  wildest  and  most  picturesque  of  her  everlasting 
temples.  Finally  the  British  colors  came  down,  and  MacDonough  had  won 
the  day.  Sir  George  Prevost  had  not  expected  it,  and  consequently  it  be 
came  necessary  to  change  his  plan.     It  consisted  in  retreating  with  his  great 


APPROACH  OF   THE  FINAL  STRUGGLE.  473 

army  in  so  much  haste,  that  the  American  commander  of  the  shattered  little 
fleet  was  left  not  only  master  of  the  water,  but  of  the  land.  Large  quantities 
of  stores  and  ammunition,  abandoned  by  the  flying  battalions  of  Prevost,  fell 
into  our  hands.  The  Green  Mountain  Boys  hung  upon  the  rear  of  Welling 
ton's  veterans,  and  the  wearied  army  left  its  blood  and  corpses  at  every  step. 

Commodore  Porter  on  the  Pacific. — While  these  events  were  transpiring  at 
home,  with  a  daring,  which  now  seems  to  resemble  temerity,  Commodore 
Porter  was  cruising  with  the  frigate  Essex  in  the  Pacific  ocean.  He  had 
captured  twelve  armed  whale  ships,  whose  aggregate  force  consisted  of  one 
hundred  and  seven  guns,  and  three  hundred  men.  One  of  the  prizes  was 
equipped,  and  receiving  the  name  of  the  Essex  jwiior,  was  given  to  the  com- 
mand of  Lieutenant  Downes.  The  British  government,  when  this  news 
arrived  from  the  Pacific,  sent  out  a  squadron  which  attacked  the  Essex, 
while  she  was  disabled  by  a  storm,  in  the  harbor  of  Valparaiso.  Commodore 
Porter  fought  until  all  his  officers  but  one,  and  three-quarters  of  his  crew, 
were  killed  or  wounded.     He  then  gave  up  the  ship  to  the  enemy. 

Other  naval  engagements,  of  less  importance  than  these,  were  constantly 
occurring  ;  but  on  the  whole,  with  all  the  disparity  of  the  contending  forces, 
the  advantages  were  chiefly  on  the  American  side. 

The  Approach  of  the  Final  Struggle. — Andrew  Jackson,  who  had  already 
displayed  those  rare  qualities  which  made  him  one  of  the  greatest  men 
of  his  times,  was  now,  with  the  rank  of  major-general  of  the  United  States 
army,  in  command  of  our  forces  at  the  South.  He  learned  that  the  fleets  of 
England  were  preparing  to  land  an  army  of  ten  thousand  men  at  New  Orleans, 
to  sweep  up  to  the  heart  of  the  country.  Jackson  took  his  decision  and 
executed  it  at  once.  A  bloody  skirmish  occurred  on  the  23d  of  December, 
in  the  neighborhood  of  New  Orleans,  without  decisive  results ;  but  the  American 
commander  had  chosen  a  strong  position,  which  he  fortified  by  splendidly 
constructed  breastworks,  which  were  to  prove  absolutely  impenetrable  to  the 
shots  of  the  enemy.  He  had  a  protection  for  one  wing  of  his  army  on  the 
river,  and  a  thick  wood  for  the  other.  Here,  with  an  inferior  force,  he  lay 
strongly  entrenched,  waiting  for  the  attack  of  Sir  Edward  Pakenham,  the 
commander-in-chief  of  the  British  forces.  The  assault  was  made,  and  with 
great  perseverance  continued  for  seven  hours,  when  he  retired  with  consider- 
able loss.  On  the  first  day  of  January,  1815,  powerful  reinforcements  had 
swelled  the  British  army  to  that  favorite  number — fourteen  thousand  able- 
bodied,  perfectly  equipped,  veteran  men.  Jackson's  entire  force  did  not  ex- 
ceed six  thousand,  and  many  of  them  had  never  seen  a  fight.  But  the  superior 
generalship  of  the  commander  was  to  more  than  atone  for  inferiority  of  num- 
bers :  while  the  ill-advised  delay  of  Pakenham  was  to  place  victory  beyond 
his  reach. 

Jackson's  Victory  at  Neiu  Orleans. — Finally,  on  the  8th  of  January,  the 


474 


PEACE   CONQUERED  AT  NEW  ORLEANS. 


grand  assault  was  made  by  the  British  army  in  all  its  strength.  They  were 
repulsed ;  but  their  wavering  columns  grew  steady  under  the  command  of 
their  veteran  leaders,  and  again  they  advanced  m  solid  phalanx  on  the  Ameri- 
can breastworks.  Once  more,  under  the  well-directed  fire  of  the  Americans, 
they  fell  back,  and  the  third  time  their  staggering  and  decimated  battalions 
closed  in,  and  went  bravely  up  to  the  desperate  work.  Platoons,  companies, 
regiments,  columns,  melted  into  the  earth.  At  last,  the  brave  Fakenham  fell 
dead  from  his  horse  ;  his  two  chief  generals  were  disabled  by  their  wounds, 
and  the  staggering  British  army  retreated  for  the  third  and  last  time,  from  the 
impregnable  ramparts.  They  had  lost  two  thousand  six  hundred  men  in  that 
terrific  battle  ;  while  General  Jackson  had  lost  but  seven  soldiers.  The  dis- 
parity seemed  incredible.1 

Peace  Co?iquered. — This  great  victory  did  for  the  Second  War  with  Eng- 
land, what  the  battle  of  Yorktown  had  done  for  the  First.  It  defeated  and 
disheartened  the  British  army,  and  put  an  end  to  the  war.  It  would  have 
been  well  for  England,  and  humanity  might  have  rejoiced  in  it,  if  that  battle 
had  never  been  fought ;  for  not  long  after  it,  news  arrived  from  Europe,  that 
in  the  previous  month  of  December,  a  treaty  of  peace  had  been  negotiated 
at  Ghent. 


Brief  Resume  of  the   Work  of  our  First  Fifty  Years. — There  had  been 


1  'Two  rockets  thrown  into  the  air  were  the  signals 
to  move  forward,  and  in  three  columns,  the  veterans  of 
six  glorious  campaigns,  covered  with  renown  as  with  a 
garment,  and  hitherto  victorious  in  every  field,  rushed 
against  an  earthen  breastwork,  defended  by  men  who 
had  hurried  from  the  plough  and  the  workshop,  to  meet 
the  invaders  of  their  country.  The  fog  lay  thick  and 
heavy  upon  the  ground,  but  the  measured  step  of  the 
centre  column  was  heard  long  before  it  became  visible, 
and  the  artillery  opened  upon  them,  directed  by  the 
sound  of  the  mighty  host,  which  bore  forward  as  one 
man  to  the  assault.  At  the  first  burst  of  artillery,  the 
fog  slowly  lifted,  and  disclosed  the  centre  column  ad- 
vancing in  deep  silence,  but  with  a  swift  and  steady 
pace.' 

'  The  field  was  as  level  as  the  surface  of  the  calmest 
lake,  and  the  artillery  ploughed  through  the  column 
from  front  to  rear,  without  for  a  moment  slacking  its 
pace  or  disordering  the  beautiful  precision  of  its  forma- 
tion. Its  head  was  pointed  against  the  centre  of  the 
Kentucky  and  Tennessee  line,  where  ten  ranks  of  mus- 
ketry stood  ready  to  fire  as  soon  as  it  came  within  one 
hundred  and  fifty  yards  ;  the  musketry  opened  along 
a  front  of  four  hundred  yards,  and  converged  upon  the 
head  of  the  column  with  destructive  effect.  There  was 
not  a  moment's  pause  in  the  fire.  The  artillery  along 
the  whole  line  discharged  showers  of  grape,  the  roll  of 
musketry  was  in  one  deep  uninterrupted  thunder,  like 
the  roar  of  an  hundred  water-falls,  and  the  central 
breastwork,  for  four  hundred  yards,  was  in  a  bright 
and  long-continued  blaze,  which  dazzled  the  eye.  Yet 
still  the  heroic  column  bore  forward,  into  the  very  jaws 
of  death,  but  it  no  longer  maintained  the  beautiful  accu- 
racy of  its  formation.  The  head  of  the  column  actually 
reached  the  ditch,  and  were  there  killed  or  taken. 
The  residue  paused  and  seemed  bewildered  for  a 
moment,  and  then  retired  in  disorder  under  the  same 
exterminating  torrent  of  fire  which  had  greeted  their 
advance.  Their  commander,  Pakenham,  had  perished  ; 
Generals  Gibbs  and  Keam,  the  next  in  command,  had 
llso  fallen.  A  host  of  inferior  officers  had  shared  the 
»me  fate,  and  their  organization  for  the  time  was  de- 
stroyed.' 

'  General  Lambert  now  succeeded  to  the  command, 
and  rallied  the  column  for  a  second  effort.     The  officers 


who  had  survived  the  terrible  burst  of  fire  from  the 
lines,  were  seen  busily  reforming  the  tanks  and  en- 
couraging the  men.  In  a  few  minutes  all  traces  of 
disorder  disappeared,  and  again  the  column  moved 
forward,  with  as  rapid  a  step,  and  proud  a  front  as  at 
first.  Again  the  artillery  tore  its  ranks  with  grape- 
shot,  until  it  came  within  range  of  small  arms,  when  the 
same  uninterrupted  thunder  of  musketry  ensued.  The 
column  did  not  again  persevere  in  advance  with  the 
heroic  fortitude  wnich  marked  the  first  effort.  They 
broke  and  fled  in  confusion,  before  arriving  within  one 
hundred  yards  of  the  lines,  and  no  efforts  of  their  offi- 
cers could  induce  them  again  to  advance.' 

k  The  river  column,  under  Lieutenant-Colonel  Ren- 
nie,  advanced  against  the  redoubt  with  a  resolution 
which  nothing  but  death  could  control.  The  same 
fatal  fire  of  artillery  and  musketry  enveloped  its  ranks. 
But  through  al'  it  persevered  in  advance,  and  mounted 
the  walls  of  the  redoubt  with  loud  cheers,  compelling 
its  defenders  to  retire  to  the  breastwork.  The  redoubt 
was  commanded  by  the  breastwork,  and  the  British 
troops  were  exposed  to  a  destructive  fire,  which  proved 
fatal  to  their  gallant  commander  and  most  of  the  infe- 
rior officers.  They  maintained  their  ground  at  an 
enormous  loss,  until  the  central  column  was  discom- 
fitted,  when  they  gave  way  and  retired  in  confusion.' 

'  The  column  under  Colonel  Jones  had  no  better 
success.  They  found  the  left  flank  greatly  strength- 
ened since  the  28th,  and  extending  so  far  into  the 
swamp  that  it  could  not  be  turned.  They  were 
greeted  with  the  same  deadly  fire  from  Coffee's  bri- 
gade, which  had  proved  fatal  to  the  other  columns, 
and  were  withdrawn  to  the  shelter  of  the  wood,  about 
the  time  that  Pakenham' s  division  was  repulsed.  The 
battle  was  over  upon  the  left  bank,  and  deep  silence 
succeeded  the  intolerable  roar,  which  had  just  tortured 
the  senses.  Enormous  masses  of  smoke  hovered  a 
few  feet  above  the  breastwork,  and  slowly  drifted 
over  the  blood-stained  field.  Horrid  piles  of  carcases 
marked  the  route  of  the  centre  column,  which  thick- 
ened as  it  approached  the  lines.  The  hostile  ranks 
were  cowering  behind  a  ditch,  within  half  range  of  the 
artillery,  unwilling  to  advance  or  retreat.  Upon  the 
right  bank  the  battle  was  still  going  on.' — Collins'  His- 
tory of  Kentucky,  vol.  i.  p.  314-316. 


THE  FRUITS  OF  FIFTY  YEARS'   WORK.  47* 

brave  and  notable  things  done  by  the  American  people  besides  fighting 
Englishmen  and  Indians  during  the  fifty  years  now  closing,  from  the  skirmish 
on  the  village  green  of  Lexington  to  this  bloody  swamp  battle  near  the  mouth 
of  the  Mississippi. 

Free  Government. — The  first,  and  greatest  of  all,  and  that  for  which  all 
other  things  were  done — that  which  alone  gave  any  value  to  all  other  achieve- 
ments, was  the  establishment  of  Free  Government  on  a  new,  broader,  more 
just,  equal,  and  lasting  basis,  than  had  ever  before  been  attempted  on  a  large 
scale  by  any  community.  It  was  not  the  rearing  of  a  structure  of  political 
power  merely;  for,  within  a  section  of  less  than  half  the  number  of  years 
we  speak  of,  a  score  of  governments  called  republican,  kingly,  imperial  even, 
had  risen — notably  the  mightiest  military  empire  for  the  time  that  ever  over- 
shadowed the  world — an  empire  which  had  dictated  law  to  every  civilized 
state  except  one  in  the  Old  World ;  whose  invincible  legions  had  trampled 
the  soil  of  so  many  countries  ;  whose  imperial  eagle  had  flown  with  the  banner 
of  its  chief  from  the  gulf  of  the  Adriatic,  to  the  pillars  of  Hercules,  and  from 
the  snows  of  Russia  to  the  sands  of  the  Pyramids ;  but  that  mighty  structure 
had  dissolved  '  like  a  vision  of  the  night  when  one  awaketh.'  Here  all  that 
had  been  attempted  in  battle  had  been  gained  ;  all  that  had  been  gained  had 
been  saved.  In  this  new  world,  war  had  been  carried  on  for  the  primary 
purpose  of  achieving  independence  and  sovereignty  for  a  single  people,  and 
this,  too,  for  the  further  sole  purpose  of  giving  that  people  a  chance  to  con- 
struct an  edifice  of  social  life,  such  an  one  as  they  thought  best  adapted  to 
secure  their  own  happiness.  Indeed  the  work  of  State  building  had  gone  on 
even  in  the  heat  of  doubtful  military  conflicts  ;  this  new  sight  was  first  wit- 
nessed here,  for  it  was  during  the  throes  of  Revolution  that  thirteen  Common- 
wealths forged  out  their  own  political  institutions,  and  they  went  into  complete 
operation  as  soon  as  the  disturbances  of  war  ceased. 

Agriculture. — So,  too,  in  the  chiefest  economy  of  life,  agriculture — 
the  subduing  of  the  soil ;  the  bringing  of  a  large  domain  under  the  control 
of  culture  ;  of  giving  the  earth  a  chance  to  yield  her  increase  for  the  food  of 
man ;  of  rooting  out  the  briers  and  thistles,  and  poisonous  weeds,  plants  and 
grasses  ;  of  draining  swampy  and  overflowed  lands  ;  of  opening  the  forest  to 
the  shining  sun,  and  letting  the  earth  breathe  and  rejoice  in  heaven's  light; 
for  devising  improved  implements  of  tillage  ;  for  the  importation  and  improve- 
ment of  fruits  and  seeds,  and  bettei  races  of  cattle  and  domestic  animals. 

Architecture, — Domestic  and  public;  but  chiefly  for  the  home,  the  house 
hold,  the  family,  the  roof-tree — the  beginning  of  all  other  institutions;  that 
first  aid  best,  and  dearest  of  all  other  social  creations  which,  in  its  sacred 
germs,  holds  the  guarantees  of  safety  and  strength  for  the  whole  community  ; 
the  parent  school  where  all  the  virtues  that  ever  adorn  or  strengthen  the 
State,  are  taught ;  the  home-nest  where  all  the  young  eagles  are  hatched  and 


476  EDUCATION  OF  THE  WHOLE  PEOPLE. 

fed,  and  grown  to  fledging,  and  flying,  and  conquest  j  that  first  altar  frorc 
which  rises  incense  that  brings  down  celestial  benedictions  upon  nations. 
Into  all  American  homes  were  introduced  the  implements  and  the  elements 
of  comfort,  of  health,  of  enjoyment. 

Domestic  Commerce. — Out  from  these  first  startings  came  domestic  com- 
merce, which  has  always  preponderated  as  ten  to  one  over  foreign.  Neighbor 
exchanged  with  neighbor  his  surplus  to  supply  his  lack ;  community  with 
community,  and  State  with  State ;  for,  from  the  beginning,  freedom  of 
domestic  commerce  was  American  law.  Neither  the  traveller,  the  merchant, 
nor  the  vendor  cared  to  ask,  nor  did  he  mind  the  knowing  when  he  passed 
the  frontier  of  a  State ;  the  national  constitution  had  guaranteed  the  same 
rights  to  all  citizens  in  all  the  States,  for  it  was  intended  to  be  one  country 
for  one  people.  The  flat  boatman,  who  had  loaded  his  craft  in  the  upper 
waters  of  the  Ohio,  would  have  no  questions  asked  him  till  his  rude  boat, 
borne  on  the  bosom  of  an  expanding  river,  had  made  a  voyage  of  two 
thousand  miles  before  it  reached  its  market.  There  was  freedom  of  port 
entry  from  the  farthest  village  of  Maine,  along  all  the  coast  round  to  the 
mouth  of  the  Mississippi.  The  explorer  along  the  waters  of  the  northern 
frontier  found  entry  at  every  harbor,  through  to  distant  Mackinaw,  and  our 
inland  adventurers,  following  the  roads  opened  by  Boone  to  the  Mississippi, 
and  Lewis  and  Clark  to  distant  Oregon,  were  all  free  to  roam  and  rove  where 
they  liked — all  under  the  protection  of  a  flag  which,  although  it  was  sustain- 
ed by  a  people  hardly  so  numerous  as  one  of  the  provinces  of  ancient  Rome, 
swayed  a  country  vaster  than  that  of  the  Caesars  : — a  territory,  too,  of  virgin 
and  not  exhausted  soil;  of  fresh  and  not  of  degenerated  and  subjugated  races. 

Education  of  the  whole  People. — Beyond  all  this,  next  to  personal  liberty, 
with  the  sacredness  of  its  guarantees,  education  was  held  to  be  the  first 
great  duty  of  the  state,  and  hence  provision  was  made  on  a  broader  scale 
than  ever  was  known  before  for  the  intellectual  illumination  of  the  great  body 
of  the  people. 

The  State  to  Educate  all  its  People. — The  grandest  feature  in  the  structure 
of  social  life  in  America,  was  the  point  from  which  the  founders  of  our  insti- 
tutions started,  viz.,  the  duty  of  the  state  to  educate  all  its  people.  When 
they  proclaimed  this  idea,  it  had  all  the  freshness,  and  culminated  in  all  the 
splendor  of  a  new  Evangel  to  the  neglected  multitude.  No  nation  had  ever 
before  thought  of  elevating  the  whole  mass  of  its  people  into  an  intellectual 
life.  They  were  not  supposed  to  participate  in  any  of  the  duties  of  citizen- 
ship, except  to  obey  the  law,  and  contribute  by  their  services,  and,  if  need  be, 
oy  their  lives,  to  sustaining  the  state.  They  were  not  partners  in  the  business 
of  carrying  on  civil  government,  and  no  thought  was  bestowed  upon  qualify- 
ing them  for  duties  they  never  would  assume.  The  nearest  approach  to  a 
plan  of  universal  education  had  been  with  the  Jews,  who  were  required  by  the 
Mosaic  law  to  instruct  their  children  in  the  institutes  of  their  fathers ;    but 


PRACTICAL  PHILOSOPHY  OF  GENERAL  EDUCATION.       477 

that  instruction  was  limited  to  a  formal  repetition  of  the  maxims  of  the 
Levitical  code,  beyond  whose  range  there  was  no  inculcation  of  freedom  of 
thought  or  action.  The  more  completely  they  were  indoctrinated  into  that 
system,  the  more  exclusive  and  narrow  they  became.  But  with  us,  in  laying 
the  foundations  of  broad  and  great  institutions,  the  cardinal  maxim  of  the 
general  education  of  the  whole  people  was  a  new  and  vital  proclamation. 
Provision  was  made  by  every  community  in  the  establishment  of  every 
colony,  and  in  the  organization  of  every  state.  This  system  was  not  indeed 
completely  carried  out  in  all  cases,  but  it  lay  at  the  basis  of  all  civil  institu- 
tions: and  they,  more  or  less  completely,  accomplished  the  objects  intended. 
It  has  been  handed  down  to  us,  growing  more  and  more  sacred  as  an  obli- 
gation as  time  went  by,  and  it  has  expanded  as  we  have  advanced  into 
new  magnitude  and  beneficence.  If  it  did  not  rear  for  us  such  institutions 
of  learning  as  could  rival  the  old  universities  of  Europe,  it  was  a  matter  of  no 
regard,  since  popular  education  was  of  infinitely  more  consequence  to  vast 
communities  than  excellence  of  attainment  among  the  favored  few.  Time 
has  vindicated  the  wisdom  of  this  system ;  for  with  the  exception  of  some  of 
the  higher  departments  of  learning,  and  the  more  abstruse  and  recondite 
fields  of  investigation,  some  of  our  colleges  have  proved  themselves  equal  to 
as  thorough  scholarship  as  the  older  institutions  of  Europe ;  while  a  vastly 
larger  proportion  of  our  people  have  risen  to  a  commendable  grade  of  learn- 
ing than  can  be  found  in  any  other  country.  Brutish  ignorance,  which  char- 
acterizes most  of  the  nations  of  Europe,  which  have  prided  themselves  on 
their  institutions  of  high  learning,  has  been  utterly  unknown  in  this  country  ; 
and  as  a  consequence  we  have  been  exempt  from  that  social  degradation 
which  has  characterized  such  large  classes  of  the  European  populations. 

The  glory  of  this  practical  philosophy  of  general  education  has  not  only 
been  displayed  in  the  familiarity  of  the  masses  with  the  elementary  principles 
of  knowledge,  but  by  the  establishment  of  colleges  and  higher  schools,  which 
have  ripened  during  late  years  into  ample  ranges  of  science.  Classical  edu- 
cation has  never  been  neglected  in  American  schools;  but  within  our  im- 
mediate time  there  has  been  displayed  a  growing  appreciation  of  science,  and 
the  establishments  which  have  recently  been  founded  for  such  specific  pur- 
poses, have  already  brought  a  much  larger  body  of  young  men  into  the  study 
of  the  natural  sciences  than  could  be  found  in  any  other  land ;  while  the  higher 
education  of  females  is  entirely  an  American  idea.  This  will  appear  when 
we  come  to  speak  of  those  new  aspects  of  education  which  will  so  soon  com- 
mand our  attention. 

It  is  therefore  chiefly,  as  we  remarked  in  the  Opening,  in  the  elevation  of 
men,  in  giving  a  new  value  to  human  life  for  the  masses  of  the  people,  that 
we  have  achieved  our  best  work,  since  if  we  had  solved  no  higher  prob- 
lems than  in  the  pure  mechanics  of  life,  in  which  we  have  outstripped  the 
world,  we  should  have  lived  in  vain.  If  man  had  gained  no  new  worth  on  this 
continent,  it  might  just  as  well  have  been  left  unwaked  from  its  dreamless 
sleep  of  ages. 


478  ONE  LANGUAGE  FOR  A  GREAT  PEOPLE. 

It  is,  therefore,  by  a  higher  standard  than  the  mere  accumulation  of 
wealth,  and  the  bettering  of  the  physical  condition  of  men,  that  we  should  be 
judged  in  the  progress  of  this  history.  I  think  I  shall  be  able  to  show  that 
our  greatest  achievements  have  been  in  those  fields  of  social,  intellectual,  and 
moral  culture  which  had  hitherto  commanded  so  little  attention  among  the 
statesmen  and  philosophers  of  the  world. 

One  Language  for  a  great  People. — Coincident  with  the  application  of 
this  philosophy  of  civil  life,  came  another  thing,  which  was  to  secure  a  pro- 
gress almost  unknown  in  this  Babel  world  of  confused  tongues — this  conti- 
nent was  to  have  one  language.  The  man  had  long  been  born  whom  Provi- 
dence had  chosen  for  the  task.  Just  at  the  close  of  the  Revolution,  Noah 
Webster  published  an  *  elementary  book  for  facilitating  the  acquisition  of  our 
vernacular  tongue,  and  for  correcting  a  vicious  pronunciation  which  prevailed 
extensively  among  the  common  people  of  this  country.'  These  are  his  words  : 
i  Soon  after  the  publication  of  that  work — I  believe  in  the  following  year — 
that  learned  and  respectable  scholar,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Goodrich  of  Durham,  one 
of  the  trustees  of  Yale  College,  suggested  to  me  the  propriety  and  expedi- 
ency of  my  compiling  a  Dictionary  which  should  complete  a  system  for  the 
instruction  of  the  citizens  of  this  country  in  the  language.  At  that  time  I 
could  not  indulge  the  thought,  much  less  the  hope  of  undertaking  such  a 
work,  as  I  was  neither  qualified  by  research,  nor  had  I  the  means  of  support 
during  the  execution  of  a  work,  had  I  been  disposed  to  undertake  it.  For 
many  years  therefore,  though  I  considered  such  a  work  very  desirable,  yet  it 
appeared  to  me  impracticable,  as  I  was  under  the  necessity  of  devoting  my 
time  to  other  occupations  for  obtaining  subsistence.' 

But  that  work  was  begun  before  the  close  of  Washington's  first  administra- 
tion, and  in  1806,  a  Compendious  Dictionary  was  published.  I  have  often 
thought  that  the  importance  of  this  event  could  not  only  never  be  exagger- 
ated, but  that  it  was  impossible  even  for  the  men  of  our  times,  living  three- 
quarters  of  a  century  later,  to  comprehend  the  greatness  of  that  event.  It 
seems  worth  the  while  to  stop  a  few  moments  here  at  the  fountain-head  of 
this  stream  of  intellectual  life  which  has  poured  its  inspirations  down  through 
the  century,  and  whose  life-giving  waters  are  to  bathe  all  the  lands  of  the 
earth.  I  need  not  use  the  language  of  the  future — this  is  being  done  already. 
I  need  not  conceal  here  what  I  think.  I  shall  be  able,  chiefly  through  the 
aid  of  my  learned  friend  John  A.  Weisse,  M.D.,  of  New  York,  who  is  about 
bringing  before  the  world  the  fruit  of  life-long  investigations,  to  show  with 
almost  the  certainty  of  a  mathematical  demonstration,  that  the  English 
language,  condensed  and  adjusted  by  philosophical  phonetic  law,  is  to  be  the 
language  of  the  human  race.1 

1  The  English  Language  and  Literature.  Analyzed  by  a  new  Method.  English,  the  Youngest,  most  Elastic, 
and  grammatically  the  Simplest  Language.  Its  Origin  and  Progress  philologically,  historically,  and  numerically 
proved.  Its  Influence  and  Importance  as  a  Means  of  Civilization.  Its  Extent  and  Destiny.  By  John  A. 
Weisse,  M.D. 

Extent,  influence,  and  importance  of  the  English  language  as  a  means  of  civilization  :  Statistics  showing  th« 
political,  social,  intellectual,  moral,  and  religious  status  of  the  populations  governed  by  the  English  language 


THE  SCHOOLMASTER  OF  THE  REPUBLIC. 


47* 


Noah  Webster — The  Schoolmaster  of  our  Republic. — It  seems  to  be  one  of 
the  laws  of  Providence,  that  the  founders  of  States  shall  never  divide  theii 
glory  with  those  who  come  after  them.  Moses,  Solon,  and  Lycurgus  j  Romu- 
lus, Alfred,  and  Washington  have  left  none  to  dispute  their  fame.  So  is  it 
with  the  Fathers  of  Learning.  The  name  of  Cadmus  inspires  to-day  the 
same  veneration  that  was  felt  for  him  by  Plato.  No  dramatic  Poet  will 
dream  of  usurping  the  throne  of  Shakespeare — no  future  Astronomer  will  lay 


The  English-speaking  populations  understand  the  science  of  Government  better  than  any  other  nation,  as  may 
be  realized  by  the  following  table  : 


ITEMS. 

earth's  statistics. 

SHARE    OF  THE    POPULATION   RULED   BY 
THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE. 

Earth 

s  Dry  Land,                   1873 
Population,                     " 

51,590,000  square  miles. 
1,377,000,000  souls. 

12,125,948  square  miles  (#). 
273,617,832  souls  (£). 

M 

Dwellings,                       " 
Commercial  Navy,         " 
War  Navy,                      " 

(26  souls  per  square  mile). 

(?) 

205,469  vessels. 

4,005  ships. 

(22  souls  per  square  mile). 

51,185,485  dwellings. 

67,282  vessels  (over  >£). 

808  ships  (1)# 

M 

Tonnage,                        " 

Railroads,                        M 
Telegraphs,                    " 

i5?72+.522  tons. 
145,825  miles. 
304,500  miles. 

9>943i727  tons  (nearly  %). 

85,660  miles  (over}£). 
146,353  miles  (nearly  %). 

M 

Submarine  Cables,        " 

52.000  miles. 

j  Almost    entirely    controlled    by    the 
|    English-speaking  populations. 

M 

Annual  Expenditure           ) 
for  Governments,       "  J 

Standing  Armies  on            | 
a  Peace  Footing,       "  f 

4,011,670,000  dollars. 

5.357iT33  soldiers. 

(1  soldier  per  257  souls.) 

1,160,930,000  dollars  (over  %). 
418,640  soldiers  (only    -J-A 
(1  soldier  per  650  souls.) 

M 
It 

M 

Imports,                            " 
Exports,                           M 
Postal  Service  from             ) 
1868  to  1871  inclusive,    ) 

6,563,620,000  dollars. 
5,228,720,000  dollars. 
3,468,227,000  letters. 
(2  letters  per  soul.) 

2,711,620,000  dollars  (over  K). 

2,466,647,000  dollars  (nearly  X). 

1,761,875,000  letters  (over  >£). 

(6  letters  per  soul.) 

Bibles  and  Testaments     *) 
distributed  by  84  Bible  ( 
Societies,  from  1804  to  j 
1874.                                 J 

117,000,000  Bibles  and  Testa- 
ments. 

84,918,215  Bibles  and  Testaments 
(over  X). 

Thus  earth's  area  is  51,590,000  square  miles,  and  its 
population  1,377,000,000.  Of  this  total  population  the 
English  language  rules  273,617,832  souls  [about  one- 
*iftk\  and  12,125,948  square  miles  (one-auarter)  of 
earth's  land.  This  land  and  its  dwellers  are  scattered 
from  the  North  Pole  to  the  Equator,  and  thence  to  the 
South  Pole.  It  abounds  in  the  most  multifarious 
mineral  and  agt  .cultural  resources  from  gold  and  dia- 
mond to  iron  and  coal,  from  wheat  to  millet,  from  the 
sturdy  oak  to  the  fragrant  cinnamon  tree.  Its  occu- 
pants cultivate  and  manufacture  the  most  varied  arti- 
cles, which  they  ship,  carry,  sell,  and  exchange  all  over 
the  globe.  The  English  language  controls  the  highways 
-*nd  by-ways  of  trade.  It  is  spoken  by  all  races  from  the 
Esquimaux,  Caucasian,  Malayan,  Hindoo,  and  Ameri- 
can Indian  to  the  Hottentot.  It  commands  most  of  the 
world's  mechanical  skill,  consequently  most  of  its 
manufactures  and  commerce,  and  most  of  its  political, 
intellectual,  social,  moral,  and  religious  influence.  The 
sun  sets  daily  on  other  leading  languages,  but  it  never 
sets  on  the  English-speaking  populations.  While  the 
speakers  of  other  leading  languages  are  plunged  in 
darkness  and  sleep,  speakers  of  English  are  wide  awake 
and  busily  at  work  in  another  hemisphere.  In  every 
country  of  the  globe  are  English-speaking  missionaries, 
trying  to  advance  Christianity,  and  with  it  their  lan- 


guage, civilization,  and  progress.  To  govern,  guard, 
and  protect  this  vast  domain  every  soul  ruled  by  the 
English  language  paid  but  $4.25  per  annual  tax,  and 
the  total  population  furnished  onl^  one  soldier  per  650 
souls  in  1873  ;  whereas  every  soul  ruled  by  the  Russian 
language  paid  $4.50,  and  the  total  population  fur- 
nished one  soldier  in  107  souls  ;  every  soul  in  the  Fa- 
therland paid  $6.30,  and  the  total  population  furnished 
one  soldier  per  102  souls  ;  every  soul  in  Italy  paid 
$11,  and  the  total  population  furnished  one  soldier  per 
80  souls  ;  every  soul  in  the  United  States  paid  $10, 
and  the  total  population  furnished  but  one  soldier  in 
1,199  souls ;  every  soul  in  Japan  paid  $4.50,  and  the 
totaL  population  furnished  one  soldier  per  289  souls. 
Hence  even  government  is  less  onerous  under  English- 
speaking  than  any  other  rule. 

In  the  imports  of  1873  the  share  of  the  English- 
speaking  populations  was  about  one-third,  while  their 
share  of  the  exports  was  nearly  one-half.  This  con- 
clusively shows  that  they  command  nearly  one-half  of 
the  world's  gold  and  silver  ;  yet  their  population  is 
but  one-fifth  of  earth's  inhabitants,  and  their  area  but 
one-quarter  of  earth's  land. 

Of  the  273  millions  ruled  by  the  English. idiom  only 
about  80  millions  speak  English.  As  far  as  can  be  sur- 
mised from  prehistoric  indications  and  historic  data. 


4S0 


EAGLISH  TO  BE  THE  UNIVERSAL  LANGUAGE. 


a  profane  hand  on  the  crown  of  Copernicus.  The  world  looks  for  no  othei 
Iliad — there  will  be  no  second  Dante.  Daniel  Webster,  has  interpreted  the 
Constitution,  and  Noah  Webster  left  us  a  Standard  of  the  English  Language 
which  will  guide  all  successive  ages. 

The  pen  is  the  only  sceptre  which  is  never  broken.  The  only  real 
master  is  he  who  controls  the  thoughts  of  men.  The  Maker  of  Words  is 
master  of  the  thinker,  who  only  uses  them.     In  this  domain  he  has  no  rival. 


no  language  has  ever  been  so  widely  diffused.  Who 
then  can,  who  will  doubt,  that  a  language  with  such  a 
choice  vocabulary,  such  vast  resources,  and  such  an 
enterprising  population,  is  destined  to  become,  at  no 
distant  period,  the  universal  language  on  earth  ?  Cir- 
cumnavigate the  globe,  go  from  pole  to  pole,  and  the 
English  tongue  will  hail  you  on  every  ocean  and  sea, 
greet  you  on  every  island,  welcome  you  in  every  haven, 
accompany  you  along  Morse's  wires  above  and  under 
water  with  lightning  speed.  Even  around  the  sources 
of  the  White  Nile  and  among  the  jungles  of  Central 
Africa,  it  echoes  from  the  lips  of  Baker  and  Living- 
stone. On  this  tour  you  meet  the  ancient  Ophir,  the 
famous  El  Dorado,  and  a  southern  continent  as  large 
as  Europe,  governed  by  the  English  idiom. 

The  English-speaking  populations  had  their  Numa 
and  Egeria  in  Ethelbert  and  Bertha,  a.d.  570;  their 
Solon  in  Alfred  the  Great ;  their  Junius  Brutus  in 
Cromwell ;  their  Cincinnatus  in  Washington  ;  their 
Homer  and  Hesiod  in  Chaucer  and  Milton  ;  their  Soph- 
ocles in  Shakespeare  ;  their  Aristode  in  Bacon  and 
Newton  ;  their  Herodotus,  etc.,  in  Hume,  Prescott, 
Gibbon,  etc.  ;  their  Hippocrates  and  Galen  in  Syden- 
ham and  Harvey  ;  their  Archimedes  in  Watt,  Frank- 
lin, Faraday,  and  Morse ;  their  Demosthenes  and 
Cicero  in  Pitt  and  Webster ;  their  Hanno  and  Near- 
chus  in  Cook,  Drake,  and  Anson ;  their  Pytheas  in  Sir 
John  Franklin  and  Dr.  Kane  :  their  Sappho  and  Co- 
rinna  in  Aphra  Behn,  Lady  Montagu,  Mrs.  Browning  ; 
their  Marco  Polo  in  Sir  John  Mandeville  ;  their  Hip- 
parchus  in  Herschel ;  their  Virgil,  etc.,  in  Dryden, 
Wordsworth,  Tennyson,  Longfellow,  Bryant,  etc.  ; 
their  Semiramis  in  Elizabeth,  and  now  their  Dido  in 
the  gentle,  but  firm  Victoria,  who  rules  over  234,762,593 
souls,  dwelling  in  44,142,651  houses.  Let  us  not  for- 
get that,  where  Greek  and  Latin  had,  in  any  branch  of 
literature  and  science,  one  eminent  author,  the  English 
idiom  has  ten.  Hence  Tyre  and  Sidon,  Greece,  Car- 
thage, and  Rome  must  go  in  the  shade  when  compared 
with  the  countries  ruled  by  the  English  language, 
comprising  the  British  Empire,  United  States,  Liberia, 
and  Sarawak.  England  and  the  United  States  should 
ever  go  hand  in  hand— for  England  and  America  at  war 
should  make  the  angels  weep,  and  cause  Hope,  Lib- 
erty, and  Justice  to  hide  their  faces.  Both  countries 
ha  /e  been  expanding  the  English  language — England 
by  sending  colonies  to  all  parts  of  the  globe— America 
by  receiving,  anglicizing,  and  assimilating  emigrants 
from  all  nations — thus  England  acting  as  the  bee- 
hive of  the  English-speaking  populations,  America 
as  their  magnet.  With  their  vast  domains,  England 
and  America  can  say  to  the  masses  of  Europe  and 
Asia  :  '  Come  unto  us,  all  ye  that  labour,  and  are 
heavy  laden,   and  we   will  give  you   rest.      Our 


yoke  is  easy,  and  our  burden  is  light.'      Matt.  xi. 
28. 

Now  notice  the  conclusive  evidence  of  a  higher  in* 
tellectual  development  among  the  English-speaking 
populations  :— The  World's  Postal  Service,  from  1868 
to  1871,  inclusive,  shows  3,468,227,000  letters  mailed 
and  carried.  Of  these  billions  and  millions  of  letters, 
1,761,875,000  (over  one-half)  were  written,  mailed,  and 
read  by  the  English-speaking  populations.  Can  there 
be  a  surer  sign  of  individual  and  national  progress,— 
'  reading  and  writing  being  the  primary  requisites 
and  key  to  knowledge  ? ' 

The  King  of  the  Fiji  Islands  ceded  his  realm  to 
Great  Britain,  September  30,  1874.  Soon  the  Naviga- 
tor Islands  will  join  their  destiny  with  that  of  the  Eng 
lish-speaking  populations,  and  to-day  Dec.  2,  1874, 
comes  the  news  by  cable  that  the  territory  between 
Cape  Colony  and  Natal  has  been  annexed  to  the  Eng- 
glish-speaking  world.  The  New  Zealanders,  who  but 
but  yesterday  were  cannibals,  numbering  about  120,000, 
over  an  area  of  95,000  square  miles,  are  being  rapidly 
christianized  under  English  rule.  The  Sandwich 
Islanders  are  being  educated  in  their  own  and  in  the 
English  language.  Of  the  four  newspapers  they 
issue,  two  are  native  and  two  English.  Ham's  pro- 
geny in  Ashantee  must  cast  their  lot  with  the  English- 
speaking  populations,  and  affiliate  with  the  Liberians, 
who  are  Hamites,  christianized  in  America.  Let  us 
not  omit  the  Icelanders,  who,  since  their  Millennial 
Celebration,  August  2d,  1874,  have  sent  a  petition  to 
His  Excellency  President  Grant,  to  negotiate  terms 
for  a  settlement  in  Alaska.  Thus  the  dwellers  of  the 
Arctic  and  Antarctic  regions,  as  well  as  those  of  torrid 
Africa,  are  casting  their  fate  with  the  English-speaking 
populations,  and  hastening  the  day  of  a  Universal 
language. 

England  and  America  can  afford  to  look  quietly  at 
the  jealousies  and  wars  in  Europe,  while  races  of  all 
climes  increase  their  domain,  and  while  everything 
points  to  a  speedy  advance  of  civilization  in  the  south- 
ern hemisphere,  whose  serene  sky,  bright  constella- 
tions, atmospheric  conditions,  telluric  formation  and 
soil  are  ready  for  higher  intellectual  development. 
Starting  with  a  superior  language  and  literature,  and 
without  mediseval  prejudices  and  drawbacks,  Oceanica 
may  soon  rival  the  mother-country.  Africa  is  attract- 
ing the  world's  attention.  England  and  America  have 
done  much,  and  may  yet  do  more  for  the  untutored 
children  of  Ham.  The  Graeco-Latin  races  of  Europe — 
France,  Italy,  and  Spain — will  gladly  aid  the  progress 
of  Africa,  where  the  fabled  Gardens  of  the  Hesperides 
may  yet  be  realized  by  the  enterprise,  daring,  and 
liberality  of  such  men  as  Baker,  Livingstone,  Stanley, 
and  Bennett. 


OUR  DEBT  TO  NOAH  WEBSTER.  481 

He  stands  at  the  fountain-head  of  thought,  science,  civilization.  He  is  con- 
troller of  all  minds— to  him  all  who  talk,  think,  write  or  print,  pay  ceaseless 
and  involuntary  tribute.  In  this  sense,  Noah  Webster  is  the  all-shaping,  all- 
controlling  mind  of  this  hemisphere.  He  grew  up  with  his  country,  and  he 
molded  the  intellectual  character  of  her  people.  Not  a  man  has  sprung 
from  her  soil  on  whom  he  has  not  laid  his  all-forming  hand.  His  principles 
of  Language  have  tinged  every  sentence  that  is  now,  or  will  ever  be  uttered 
by  an  American  tongue.  His  genius  has  presided  over  every  scene  in  the 
Nation.  It'  is  universal,  omnipotent,  omnipresent.  No  man  can  breathe 
the  air  of  the  continent,  and  escape  it. 

The  Sceptre  which  the  great  Lexicographer  wields  so  unquestionably 
was  most  worthily  won.  It  was  not  inherited — it  was  achieved.  It  cost  a 
life-struggle  for  an  honest,  brave,  unfaltering  heart — a  clear,  serene  intellect. 
No  propitious  accidents  favored  his  progress.  The  victory  was  won  after  a 
steady  trial  of  sixty  years.  Contemplate  the  indices  of  his  progress  ;  for 
Science,  like  machinery,  measures  its  revolutions.  When  the  wheels  of  our 
ocean  steamers  have  moved  round  a  million  times,  the  dial-hand  marks  one. 
It  was  so  with  Galileo  and  Bacon — their  books  marked  their  progress 
through  the  unexplored  seas  of  Learning.  It  was  so  with  Webster.  When 
our  Republic  rose,  he  became  its  Schoolmaster.  There  had  never  been  a 
great  Nation  with  a  universal  language  without  dialects.  The  Yorkshireman 
cannot  now  talk  with  a  man  from  Cornwall.  The  peasant  of  the  Ligurian 
Apennines  drives  his  goats  home  at  evening  over  hills  that  look  down  on 
six  provinces,  none  of  whose  dialects  he  can  speak.  Here,  5,000  miles 
change  not  the  sound  of  a  word.  Around  every  fireside,  and  from  every  tri- 
bune, in  every  field  of  labor  and  every  factory  of  toil,  is  heard  the  same 
tongue.  We  owe  it  to  Webster.  He  has  done  for  us  more  than  Alfred  did 
for  England,  or  Cadmus  for  Greece.  His  books  have  educated  four  genera- 
tions. They  are  for  ever  multiplying  his  innumerable  army  of  thinkers,  who 
will  transmit  his  name  from  age  to  age.  Only  two  men  have  stood  on  the 
soil  of  the  New  World,  whose  fame  is  so  sure  to  last — Columbus  its  Dis- 
coverer, and  Washington  its  Saviour.  Webster  is,  and  will  be  its  great  Teacher  j 
and  these  three  make  our  Trinity  of  Farjie.1 

1  In  the  year  1782,  when  Noah  Webster  was  only  own,  who  were  recognized  on  the  other  side  of  the  wa« 
twenty-four  years  old,  he  conceived  apian  of  preparing  teras  men  of  great  ability,  and  not  unworthy  to  teach, 
and  publishing  a  series  of  school-books  to  aid  in  the  Englishmen  and  Scotchmen.  Jonathan  Edwards, 
better  education  of  the  children  of  America.  In  a  very  Samuel  Hopkins,  Joseph  Bellamy,  and  others,  natives- 
able  review  of  Noah  Webster's  life  and  writings,  in  the  of  this  same  little  commonwealth  of  Connecticut,  had 
Congregationalist  Quarterly,  for  January,  1865,  Rev.  already  carried  theological  science  beyond  the  Euro- 
Increase  N.  Tarbox,  of  Boston,  says  :  '  How  thorough-  pean  limitations.  But,  in  the  world  of  letters  gener- 
ly  original  this  plan  was  for  a  youth  of  his  years,  and  ally,  we  were  as  yet  like  little  children,  looking  eagerly 
in  the  circumstances  of  those  days,  we  cannot  ade-  and  reverendy  to  the  mother  country  for  our  sup- 
quately  apprehend  without  a  moment's  thought.  plies. 

'  Up  to  that  time,  we  had  been  living  in  a  state  of  '  It  was  therefore  a  truly  bold  conception  when  Noah 

colonial  dependence,  and  were  in  the  most  complete  Webster,  in  the  year  1782,  determined  to  compile  and 

literary  vassalage   to  the   Mother  Country.     All  our  issue  a  series  of  school-books.     It  was  the  first  thing  of 

books  of  elementary  instruction,  as  well  as  the  main  the  kind  which  had  ever  been  attempted  in  the  United 

part  of  all  our  general  literature,  came  to  us  from  Eng-  States.     After  the  preliminary  work  of  preparation  was 

land.     In  the   department  of  theology,  it  is  true,  we  done,  he  returned  from  Goshen   to  Hartford,  and  in 

«-ere  already  raising  up  thinkers  and  writers  of  our  1783  published  the  American  Spelling-Book.  lu  Um 
31 


482 


FORTUNES  OF  WEBSTER'S  SPELLING-BOOK. 


years  immediately  following,  he  published  an  English 
Grammar  and  a  Reading-Book. 

*  The  fortunes  of  this  spelling-book  have  been  truly 
remarkable.  Though  humble  in  form  and  modest 
in  its  pretensions,  it  has  at  length  acquired  a  cele- 
brity of  which  any  author  might  well  be  proud.  In  a 
preface  to  this  book,  written  in  1803,  Mr.  Webster  says: 

'  "  The  American  Spelling-Book,  or  First  Part  of  a 
Grammatical  Institute  of  the  English  Language,  when 
first  published,  encountered  an  opposition  which  few 
new  publications  have  sustained  with  success.  It 
nevertheless  maintained  its  ground,  and  its  reputation 
has  been  gradually  extended  and  established  until  it 
has  become  the  principal  elementary  book  in  the  United 
States.  In  a  great  part  of  the  Northern  States  it  is 
the  only  book  of  the  kind  used  ;  it  is  much  used  in  the 
Middle  and  Southern  States  ;  and  its  annual  sales 
\ndicate  a  large  and  increasing  demand."  * 

In  a  note,  written  in  1818,  and  published  in  the 
edition  then  issuing  from  the  press,  we  are  told  that 
'The  sales  of  the  American  Spelling-Book,  since  its 
first  publication,  amount  to  more  than  Jive  millions  of 
copies,  and  they  are  rapidly  increasing.'  From  this 
time  onward  the  circulation  was  greatly  extended.  In 
the  year  1847,  when  Prof.  Goodrich  wrote  and  pub- 
lished his  memoir  of  Dr.  Webster,  then  deceased,  he 
tells  us  : 

'  About  twenty-four  millions  of  this  book  have  been 
published  down  to  the  present  year  (1847),  in  the 
different  forms  which  it  assumed  under  the  revision  of 
its  author  ;  and  its  popularity  has  gone  on  continually 
increasing.  The  demand  for  some  years  past  has 
averaged  about  one  million  of  copies  a  year.' 

Soon  after,  as  A^e  learn  from  good  authority,  the 
publication  and  sa  .e  of  this  little  work  were  still  further 
increased.  The  annual  demand  came  to  be  about  one 
million  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  copies,  and  so 
continued  down  to  the  opening  of  the  war.  Taking 
these  several  estimates  and  combining  them,  we  find 
that  the  whole  circulation  of  this  work,  down  to  the 
present  time,  is  not  far  from  fifty-two  millions.  This 
number  is  so  enormous,  that  the  mind  is  staggered  in 
any  attempt  to  follow  out  the  details,  and  we  only 
think  of  the  whole  as  something  vast  and  indefi- 
nite. 

Mr.  Tarbox  computes  that,  at  the  opening  of  the 


present  century,  there  were,  in  all  the  world,  not  mom 
than  four  millions  of  copies  of  the  Bible.  But  since 
that  time  the  British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society,  and 
the  American  Bible  Society,  have  published  of  Bibles 
and  Testaments  one  hundred  and  seventeen  millions 
Here  we  have  an  enterprise  of  world-wide  influence 
and  most  commanding  importance.  The  only  purpose 
in  making  this  reference  is  to  convey  some  adequate 
idea,  by  the  aid  of  such  a  comparison,  of  the  enormous 
issue  and  sale  of  this  humble  volume. 

'  The  book  is  not  merely  a  spelling-book.  It  is  a 
book  of  the  most  wholesome  moral  and  religious  in- 
struction. The  world  was  not  then  so  refined  as  it  is 
now.  Nobody  seemed  to  be  afraid  to  have  a  little  re- 
ligion carried  into  the  district  school-house.  Those  nice 
questions  of  religious  toleration,  those  measures  of  cau- 
tion lest  one  sect  or  denomination  should  trespass 
upon  another,  had  not  come  up  for  consideration.  Our 
fathers  were  rude  and  plain  men,  and  did  not  know 
how  much  they  suffered  by  having  the  strong  truths  of 
the  Bible  taught  their  children  in  the  common  exercises 
of  the  day-school.  And  so  it  was  the  most  natural  thing 
in  the  world  that  Mr.  Webster  should  make  a  spelling- 
book,  which  should  at  the  same  time  be  a  manual  of 
good  manners  and  morals,  and  even  of  earnest  religi- 
ous truth.  And  it  is  by  virtue  of  these  features  that 
the  history  of  this  book,  throughout  the  wide  range  of 
its  influence,  is  not  to  be  regarded  as  the  history  of  a 
spelling-book  merely.  It  has  left  its  marks  all  along 
on  the  moral  and  religious,  as  well  as  on  the  intellec- 
tual character  of  the  young.' 

It  is  a  matter  of  surprise  that  the  sales  of  this  book 
have  been  larger  recently  than  they  were  twenty  or 
thirty  years  ago,  since  other  spelling-books  without 
number  have  been  introduced  and  absolutely  forced  on 
the  Common  Schools  of  the  whole  United  States  ;  but 
the  sales  of  it  have  of  late  years  rapidly  increased.  It 
has  for  some  time  been  published  by  the  Appletons, 
of  New  York,  who  have  made  it  a  specialty.  They 
print  more  than  one  million  copies  of  it  annually. 

How  many  tens  of  thousands  of  Webster's  Una- 
bridged American  Dictionary  of  the  English 
Language  the  Merriams  have  published,  I  can  only 
conjecture.  It  has  gone,  with  Shakespeare  and  tho 
Bible,  wherever  the  English  tongue  is  spoken,  and 
like  them  its  mission  has  only-just  begun. 


END  OF  VOL.  \ 


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